


Instinct and Affliction

by RosalindInPants



Category: The Great Library Series - Rachel Caine
Genre: Aftermath of Torture, Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Drug-Induced Sex, Flashbacks, Hallucinations, Heavy Angst, Hurt/Comfort, Knotting, M/M, Mating Cycles/In Heat, Miscarriage, Non-Consensual Drug Use, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Rape Aftermath, Sleep Deprivation, Threats of Rape/Non-Con, Torture, Touch-Starved, Whump
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-10-21
Updated: 2020-10-17
Packaged: 2020-10-30 14:47:36
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 10
Words: 41,095
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20774186
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RosalindInPants/pseuds/RosalindInPants
Summary: As an omega, Christopher Wolfe never minded his heat cycles. With his alpha partner, Niccolo Santi, heat meant the enjoyment of days in bed together. As a gold band Scholar, he always had access to heat-blocking medication when taking time off with Nic wasn't an option.Until his arrest. In the prison beneath Rome, Wolfe's body turned against him, adding to his torment.





	1. Rome

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> As the chapter title says, this one takes place in Rome. There is explicit torture, including threats of rape. No real comfort here.

_ **August, 2029** _

It would have been miserable enough to be in heat without Nic if he had been at home. But then, if Wolfe had been at home, he would have had his heat-blocking pills, and he wouldn't have felt the stirrings of need prickling his sensitive parts. Even if the pills had failed, though, or if he had been distracted by work and missed a dose, he would have had his comfortable bed to nest in, and a selection of toys to help him scratch the itch, and a shower to wash himself off after it passed.

Here, he had none of that. Not even anything to rub against, with his hands cuffed above his head to a chain hung from the ceiling of his cell. Not so much as a stitch of clothing to conceal his condition from view. There was just enough slack in the chain that he could shift his weight from foot to foot, or stand on tiptoes, or let himself hang by his wrists, each option painful in its own way, and none of any help in relieving the ache of need that came with his heat.

He'd been in that position for the better part of a day, measured by the changing of the guards, and the pain would have been unbearable enough on its own. But with his skin growing hotter and his fluids dripping down his legs, it was enough to drive him toward madness.

Every guard that passed by the bars was an alpha. That had to be part of the torture. Their scents forced their way into his nose even when he tried to breathe through his mouth, making his body burn with longing. His throat was dry, his face dripping with sweat that made his hair cling to his neck in wet clumps. His neck, gods, his neck, that spot where Nic would bite him when they came together. Without meaning to, he tilted his head to the side, stretching out his neck the way he would for Nic.

Phantom teeth grazed his skin, and he moaned, too desperate and needy a sound to be mistaken for pain. Laughter rang out beyond the bars, and he opened his eyes to see a pair of guards marching away, their musky scents lingering in the air. One thick and syrupy sweet, the other a warm spice, both shamefully arousing. He longed for Nic's smoky cedar, but, gods help him, his body would have given itself to either of them in a heartbeat.

Perhaps, in a way, he was grateful for the cuffs. The cuffs kept him from following the instinct that drove him to position himself for them. He didn't want their knots. At least, in his heart and mind he didn't. But his body was a traitorous thing, and weak as he was, he wasn't sure he could fight it.

Closing his eyes, he tried to soothe himself with memories of Nic. He'd always had a vivid imagination, but he had been actively developing it over these past weeks, bringing Nic to life in his mind to hold him through the cold nights and to distract himself from the pain. Just now, he would have given anything for even the touch of Nic's hand. He could almost feel it, soft against his face. He could almost hear Nic's voice.

_Look at you, all wet and ready for me. Do you want this, Christopher?_ He could see Nic standing before him, nude, his erection on full display, his muscles tense with the effort of holding himself back. Nic always held onto control just long enough to ask.

He sobbed at that vision, the beautiful perfection of it. Nic, his Nic, there to fill him and satisfy him. There were Nic's hands, rubbing his aching limbs, Nic's lips, seeking the places made painfully sensitive by the rush of hormones coursing through his blood. Nic's cock, there at his entrance, teasing him before pushing in.

His ass thrust backward to meet his phantom lover, and the searing pain that sent through his arms and legs tore him out of the dream. His scream echoed in his ears.

The next thing he heard was laughter. Cruel, taunting laughter. The guards, passing by his cell again. The one that smelled of spices gripped the bars and pressed his face in close to sniff the air. "Mmm, smell that? He's all ripe and ready now. Think we'll get a go at him?"

The sweet-smelling alpha scoffed at that. "Orders from Master Qualls are he's not to be touched. Come on, you're going to put yourself in a rut, and you know the captain won't approve comfort leave when it's your own fault. You'll be humping your own hand in isolation, and I'll have latrine duty for letting you get yourself into that state. Hold your damn breath."

The alpha at the bars took another long sniff. "I can handle it. Not like this omega whore here. Did you hear that? No knot for your hole. You get to keep humping the air. Bet you'll be begging by the time we come back around."

Wolfe glared, ineffective as the expression probably was on his tear-streaked face. He wouldn't beg. He might not be able to keep his body from its shameful displays, but he could keep his mouth shut.

The sweet-smelling alpha tugged on his companion's arm, and with a final lick of his lips, the other alpha walked away.

Wolfe let his knees go slack, putting his weight on his wrists and letting the screaming agony of that drown out the desperation of his heat. If he had no choice but to hurt, he could at least choose the form his pain would take. This sort was pure, in its way. Almost cleansing.

Eventually, by instinct, his legs straightened, taking the pressure from his wrists and shoulders again and reminding him that the lower half of his body existed. Not a reminder he wanted. Every muscle in his legs still burned even after their brief rest, but that was nothing compared to the sensation between them. He had to be near the peak of his heat now; it had been building since before they chained him up, just a nuisance then. A slight increase in hunger and thirst, which went unanswered as he was served the usual inadequate and barely edible slop that passed for food in this place. A flush of warmth in his skin, just enough to make the stone floor seem all the rougher and the air all the colder. Increased blood flow to his nether regions, of course. All of those, he could bear. But not this deep and insistent craving.

He needed something to fill him. Even just to touch his dripping hole. A single finger. He would take a single finger, just to have something to answer his body's demands.

_Oh, Nic, please, I need you. _

The illusion of his partner answered his call. Ghostly hands ran down his back. Teeth pressed against his neck. Nic's fingers found their way lower, lower, until they pressed inside, rubbing his wet and hungry flesh. _That's it. Open for me. Relax._

It wasn't enough. It wasn't nearly enough. He needed pressure. He needed to be filled. _Fuck me, Nic, please._

_Relax, Christopher. Let me in. _Nic's phantom hands gripped his hips, and the head of his cock pushed inward.

Trembling with the effort of holding his hips still, of standing at all on exhausted legs, Wolfe called on every memory he had of Nic's cock. The round head. The veins pulsing around the shaft. The thick knot that formed when they joined in heat and rut. If he could just picture it clearly enough, maybe the illusory whisper of it would take on form and substance enough to bring him relief.

But he couldn't. Imagination refused to cross the boundary that walled it off from reality, and the hallucination of Nic could not stretch him, could not fill him, could not lock their bodies together. All it could do was add to his torment.

With a shout of fury, he willed the illusion away. Standing on one foot so that the pain in his leg took on a sharper pitch, he forced himself to search further back in his memories. He'd endured heats without Nic before. He could do it again.

Keeping his mind busy would help. Like any accomplished Scholar, he had memorized key texts in his field, and he called to mind the driest work of mathematical theory he could, silently reciting it word for word. Numbers. The world could be described in numbers. He could reduce the things he was feeling now to equations. The cycles and levels of hormones. The dimensions of the cell. The passage of time. The probability that his shoulders would dislocate when he gave up on distracting himself and gave himself over to the agony of hanging by his wrists.

This time, the pain ended not with his legs reasserting themselves, but with the slackening of the chain. It fell quickly, leaving him to collapse to the floor in a trembling heap, every limb screaming. At first, all he could do was sob. From pain, from relief, from shameful yearning.

But when he got enough control of himself to lift his head, Qualls was there. The man never had any scent to him. Even now, with Wolfe's nose so sensitized that he could detect the two guards down the hall, Qualls had no scent at all. Whether that made him a beta, or an alpha or omega who took his blocking medication religiously, Wolfe couldn't be sure, but he was grateful for it. He wouldn't be able to resist an alpha's scent now, and he didn't know how he would bear the shame of presenting his backside to his torturer.

"I hope you have found this _instructive_, Scholar Wolfe. I am granting you a period of rest before our next session together. Is there anything that you would like to confess now? I might offer relief for your... condition, if you prove unusually cooperative."

Wolfe blinked at him, his mind unusually slow to process the man's words. Heat blocking drugs. Qualls was offering heat blocking drugs. Wolfe had asked for them when he felt the first symptoms of heat, and he'd been denied. Gods only knew if they'd do any good when he was this far in. But no, there was another sort of relief. An alpha. Qualls could bring in one of those guards. His body reacted to the thought of that with an involuntary squirm of his hips, even as his mind reeled with revulsion.

With every drop of will left him him, he forced his body to be still. "I've already told you everything," he said, his voice ragged and painful in a throat dry and raw from screaming.

Qualls crouched beside him and placed a hand on his cheek. "You only make things worse for yourself with this obstinacy. This does not have to be so hard."

Wolfe leaned into the touch. He hated himself for it, but it was taking everything he had in him to keep his hips still, and it had been so long since he'd been touched gently. "No," he whimpered. "No. Stop."

The torturer stood. "So you remain stubborn. Very well. Use this time to think on the consequences of your actions, Scholar Wolfe. When I return, I hope to find you in a more cooperative mood."

When the cell door clanged shut again, Wolfe fought the urge to move. There were footsteps in the hall, and the scents of the two alpha guards coming closer. Different ones, this time, one a heady floral scent, the other like newly cut wood. He closed his eyes, pretending to be unconscious as they passed. The scents were so strong he couldn't keep his hips entirely still. His bottom shifted, raising from the floor. He hoped it looked more pathetic than inviting. He hoped they didn't look too closely.

If they saw, they said nothing, and their footsteps receded.

He had to do something about this, had to relieve even a little of the need so he could get himself under control. Had he been free, he could have pushed his fingers into himself and thrust until the itch grew less intense. But with his wrists cuffed together in front of him and his muscles all stiff and sore, he couldn't get his hands into an effective position for that. He could reach his cock, but that was entirely useless. Enjoyable as it could be when he wasn't in heat, touching it when he was in this state only increased his arousal. He couldn't come no matter how much he jerked it, and with heavy irons on his sore and weakened wrists, that wouldn't have been long, anyway.

The cell was bare, just stone walls and a stone floor, not even a bunk he could have ground against the leg of. Not an implement anywhere he could have shoved into himself. He considered and dismissed the chain that remained attached to his cuffs. Not rigid enough. That left the stone wall. There was enough chain for him to reach any of the walls, so he chose a spot to the side of the door, where he might be less visible. Crawling on elbows and knees, he positioned himself with his rear to the wall, bare skin on rough stone. A blessing in disguise that he hadn't been granted clothing since his last trip down the hall. Rubbing against the stone was going to hurt, but without pants in the way, he might find satisfaction more quickly. Or maybe he'd hurt himself enough to stop wanting an alpha's cock. That would be an acceptable outcome.

He pressed back against the wall and let his hips move in a slow circle. Definitely painful, the stone scraping his skin, but the pressure that motion put against his hole came as a relief, if an incomplete one. He kept at it. Like scratching an itch. Like an animal, devoid of all sense. Some distant, sensible part of his mind cried out at the shame of it. But oh, it felt better to move, to grind against the stones that grew slicker with each circle of his hips, even if no amount of squirming could get his hole directly against the stone.

He heard moaning, and it took a moment to recognize it as his own. And there were footsteps, when he listened. Getting closer.

The guards. Why was he worried about the guards? They smelled like alphas. He needed an alpha.

With that small part of his mind that still held onto his sense of self screaming in horror, he crawled toward the bars, toward the nearing scents of wood and flowers. Which would be the one to mount him, he wondered. He hoped it would be the wood. He liked the smell of wood.

Wood. Cedar. _Nic_.

Shame coursing through him, he dropped to the floor, curling into a tight ball and whimpering as he rolled himself back away from the door. _No_. He breathed through his mouth despite the dryness of it, pressing his hands to his face to ward off the scent. He didn't want those alphas. He _didn't_. He wanted Nic. Gods, he needed Nic so badly.

And there he was, the illusion of him, ephemeral but comforting all the same. Nic stroked his hair and kissed him, soft and gentle. He couldn't smell Nic, but he could almost taste him. He could feel Nic's hand rubbing his back, and hear Nic's voice. _You will make it through this. Breathe, Christopher. I am here._

If he concentrated on the sound of Nic's voice and the feeling of Nic's touch, he could fight this. He would not offer himself to these other alphas. He was Nic's.

_Yes. You are mine, and I am yours, and I will protect you. All you need to do now is breathe._

One breath at a time, he listened to the footsteps as they drew nearer and then farther again. How many times would he have to do this? He knew the timing of the patrols, the duration of his heats, but the numbers floated beyond his grasp.

_Don't think about that, Chris. Relax now. Sleep. This will be easier if you sleep._ Much like the real thing, phantom Nic was very reasonable.

Wolfe rolled further away from the door, rolling the chain around himself in the process. There. That would stop him if his instincts tried to take control again. Even that small effort had him dizzy and panting. He was tired, so tired that the pain in his muscles and the desperation of his heat were fading, overpowered by exhaustion. He still yearned to go and grind against the wall again, but the very thought of moving so much was enough to make his body go limp.

The hallucination of Nic settled in behind him, wrapping strong arms around him and nuzzling his neck. The way he did after they'd fucked themselves into exhaustion during a heat together. He missed this more than he missed Nic's cock, whatever his instincts might tell him. Those simple, loving touches. Little kisses. Caresses. Tiny acts of affection he'd taken for granted. He leaned into the embrace of his illusion, and he imagined Nic's lips on his neck, and the warmth that filled his heart was enough to block out the pain until he found his way into sleep.


	2. Rome

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> See all those tagged warnings? Yes. Those all apply here. Read at your own risk.

_ **October, 2029** _

Wolfe was so exhausted when his next heat came that he missed the earliest symptoms. It had been weeks since his last visit with Qualls in the room at the end of the hall, but his cell was no safe haven. In the past week - maybe more, it was getting harder to track the passage of time - he had barely been allowed to sleep. It seemed that every time he found his way into dreams, he was dragged from them. The methods varied; it seemed the guards had been given latitude to wake him by any means they pleased. Some used noise, others buckets of icy water. A particularly lazy guard carried a long staff and poked it through the bars of the cell to strike him, grumbling with irritation when it took more than one blow. The results were the same regardless of method. He woke, disoriented, and the discomfort kept him from finding his way back to sleep for a time until exhaustion won out once more and the cycle repeated.

He saw Nic often during that time. The illusion was gaining strength and solidity as his mind degraded, until, at times, he was certain that Nic really was there at his side. Nic held him. Nic whispered in his ear. Nic soothed him back to sleep.

Nic was there with him when the guards came for him with irons for his wrists, and Nic's hand on his shoulder kept the fear at bay while the guards shackled him and escorted him out of the cell. But by the time he reached his destination, Nic was gone. Part of his mind insisted that this meant Nic was trapped back in his cell.

That was good, though. Better that Nic be there than here. They'd brought him to the little room that Qualls used for meetings. Not much bigger than the cells, but it had its small comforts. A rug on the stone floor. A bed with blankets and pillows. A steaming bath. A table set with tea and sweets.

Qualls was not there.

In his months of imprisonment, Wolfe had been brought to this room enough times to know that it represented no real relief, even if the guards told him he was being given an opportunity to rest. There was always a catch, a cruel twist to the comfort being offered. Soon enough, Qualls would come to taunt him with threats or lies or sadistic bargains. So when the guards closed and locked the door behind him, he resisted the siren song of the bed. Whatever was in store for him, he wanted to be awake to see it coming.

With the choice between the food and the bath, he opted for the bath. His meals, unappetizing as they were, had been coming on a regular enough schedule that he could wait to devour the cakes on the table. They would taste better without the reek of his unwashed body dominating his senses. And he could put clean clothes on if he bathed. They looked like decent clothes, this time. Not the silk he could only feel in dreams, but a soft cotton. Comfortable. Warmer than the thin rags he wore now.

He could feel himself falling into the trap, starting to believe in the false promise of the room, but by all the gods, how could he not? He was so tired, so sore, so cold, that even temporary relief was worth it. Even if it would make the pain worse when the inevitable betrayal came.

And there was the possibility of averting the betrayal, he thought as he lowered himself into the warm water, driving off the constant chill of the prison. He might fall unconscious from exhaustion, slip beneath the water, and never resurface. It was supposed to be a peaceful enough end. He couldn't do it deliberately - his body would fight for survival, as it always did - but if it simply happened... Yes, that was something to hope for. A more realistic hope than the fantasies of release and rescue that he senselessly still tormented himself with.

Letting himself sink down until only his nose remained above the water, he reached for the exhaustion that had hounded him in the past days. He was warm, he was comfortable, that should have been enough to lull him into sleep. But when he took a deep and relaxing breath, he smelled it. Smoky cedar.

Nic.

He sat up quickly enough that water sloshed from the tub and the skin of his upper body screamed in protest at the sudden chill. Frantic, he looked around. Nic had to be there. Hallucinations didn't have scents.

But, no, it wasn't Nic. Only a coil of incense smoldering in a burner on the other side of the room, close to the bed. When he breathed it deeply, he could smell the difference. There was no sweat, no flesh, no animal musk, only the smoky wood. It must have been lit right before he entered the room, for him not to have smelled it right away. Or maybe his own stench really had been that bad.

His own stench. Gods, no, not again. But there it was, unmistakable now that he paid attention to it, now that the shock of thinking he smelled Nic had shaken him fully awake. Beneath the filth, his scent was stronger. Sandalwood and parchment, a heavy release of pheromones that would have triggered Nic's rut, had Nic been there.

Just thinking about Nic was enough to make him ache to be filled. It wasn't unbearable, not yet, but it would be. This time, at least, he was free to do something about it. He had his hands, and in the warm embrace of the water, that was almost enough.

After he'd scratched the itch as well as it could be scratched, he washed, taking real pleasure in scrubbing and brushing his hair. With the scent of cedar in the air, he could almost imagine he was preparing himself for Nic, the way he would have done if they were home. But, no, he couldn't let his thoughts go in that direction. The longing would drive him mad. He recited Aristotle to himself while he dried and dressed, keeping his mind occupied with something other than the scent growing increasingly thick in the air.

He kept that recitation going while he sat at the table and poured himself a cup of tea, inhaling the steam deeply to give his nose something different to process. The usual Assam, but spiced this time, with ginger and what might have been some kind of citrus. An unusual combination of flavors. None of the subtleties of the green and white teas he favored, but good. So much better than the foul water that came with his usual rations. The first cake he bit into was good, too, a chocolate almost unbearably rich. He ate slowly, letting himself luxuriate in the flavor. In the back of his mind, a clock ticked down to the pain he knew would come, but he tried to ignore it.

By the time he'd drained his first cup of tea and filled his stomach to bursting with cake, heat and exhaustion had crept in on him. His skin grew hot, until sweat dampened his new clothes. Sweat and the fluids of arousal. He'd have thought his new pants ruined, just months ago, but now he knew that he would live with the stain gladly if he were permitted to keep the pants at all. His vision blurred, and his ears rang. If the bed had looked tempting before, it was near irresistible now. He wanted to arrange the pillows and blankets and burrow into it.

Instead, he gulped down another cup of tea and returned to his recitation. He didn't want to be asleep when they came for him. The caffeine would keep him awake.

The caffeine should have kept him awake.

But his head fell forward, and his limbs went limp, and he woke with a start to his head hitting the table. The room spinning, he sat up again, holding himself upright with wobbly arms. He was drunk. That was impossible. Just that tired.

He picked up the teapot to pour himself another cup, but it was empty. His eyes lingered too long on the spout, the long, almost phallic shape of it. He dropped the thing as if it had burned his hands, and it clattered down onto the table. No. _No_. He was not that desperate.

He had to sleep. There was no choice. Sleep the heat off like he'd done last time. If he let the exhaustion take him now, the worst might be over by the time he woke.

If not, well, touching himself under the blankets would be far less embarrassing than fucking himself with a teapot.

Standing seemed a monumental effort on legs that felt like they'd turned to water, but he got himself out of the chair and staggered across the room until the blurry shape of the bed grew close enough to fling himself onto. He pushed the pillows around until they made a passable nest, wrapped himself in the blankets, and let himself fall into the gaping chasm of exhaustion.

_Wolfe dreamed, and Nic was there. Warm and solid and smelling of smoky cedar, Nic was there._

_He opened his eyes to darkness that seemed to spin around him and press against him. Darkness, and the painful emptiness of the peak of his heat._

_Hands ran over his body, soft and slow. Petting his side. Pulling back the covers. The smell of cedar was so thick in the air he could taste it. His eyes strained against the dark, but Nic remained a shadow leaning over him._

_He tried to roll to face Nic, tried to reach out for him, but his body felt like it was made of sodden wool, heavy and limp. A frustrated whine emerged from his lips, and it seemed to echo in his ears._

_A finger to his lips, covered by a soft leather glove, silenced him. "Shh." The whispering sound swept around him like a gust of wind._

_Like the hands moving over his body, rolling him onto his stomach. Stroking his back, his sides. His hips._

_His head spun, but his hips knew what to do. Following the demands of instinct, his body allowed Nic to shift it into position._

_Lips brushed his neck. Cold air embraced bare skin as clothes fell away._

_Nic filled him, and he cried from the relief of it._

_For a dizzying moment, the dream satisfied him. But not enough. There was no knot to fill him fully. No knot to quiet the screaming of his instincts._

_With tears streaming down his cheeks and the room spinning around him, he cursed the dream, its cruelty in offering him a Nic so solid and yet so incomplete._

_It took a long time for the dream to end. Only after Nic finished and tucked him back under the blankets did it drift away, fading into new dreams as Nic wiped the tears from his face._

He woke with the pain of emptiness and his pants around his knees. Gods, how vividly he had dreamed, to have undressed himself in his sleep. The light of the glows made his head throb, and his stomach churned when he moved, but the need was stronger than any of that, so he thrust a shaking hand down to penetrate himself, finding himself wet and sticky.

That was wrong.

_Ra, Isis, Osiris, all the gods of Egypt, all the gods of the world, please, let me be wrong._

He brought his hand back up. Held it to his face. Spread his trembling fingers.

Streaks of white shot through the clear fluid.

Bile burned in his throat and he doubled over, his stomach purging itself of all he'd eaten, as if that could purge him of the shame and the betrayal, too.

That was how the guards found him, curled on the bed with his new clothes covered in filth. They didn't say a thing, they didn't hurt him, they just hauled him back to his cell and left him there. They left him alone, and that was so much worse than any torture Qualls could have inflicted on him. Pain would have spared him from the viciousness of his own thoughts.

Days passed. Weeks. And still, they left him alone, delivering his meals and emptying the bucket that served as his toilet in stony silence. Not even a harsh look.

It would have been so much easier if they had been cruel. Then he could have hated someone other than himself.

Nic came to him in those weeks, gentle and forgiving, but the illusion had never been harder to believe. Nic might forgive him, but he couldn't forgive himself. He could reason through it, he could see how he had been manipulated, but that only made him all the more furious with himself. He should have known better than to fall for it. He should have recognized the drug in the tea. He had mistaken his torturer for his lover, and neither love nor logic could absolve him of that.

Weeks passed, and nausea plagued him. He thought it was revulsion until his chest and hips started to ache. Until he could no longer deny that something was growing inside him.

When the nausea grew so bad that he could scarcely eat, they dragged him down the hall.

When they brought him back to his cell, he was bleeding.


	3. Rome

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> See all those tagged warnings? Yes. Those all apply here. Read at your own risk. There is just a bit of comfort in this one, but mostly hurt.

_ **February, 2030** _

Wolfe thought himself clever. When his next heat came on, and the guards brought him to the comfortable room, he didn't touch the tea. He didn't touch the food, either, to be safe.

It took all his will. They'd starved him, over the preceding week. Denied him even water for more than a day.

He drank the water in the bath until his stomach thought it was full, and he sat with his head against the wall, trying not to think about the demands of his body. Those needs would be used against him, if he allowed it. He wouldn't fall for that again.

The door opened. He caught a glimpse of Qualls out of the corner of his eye, and the door shut again.

Minutes later, the door opened again, and the smells of honey and spice filled the room.

Alphas. The guards.

He fought both of them, along with his own instincts, with every shred of strength remaining in him. They were stronger. More savage.

They took what they wanted and threw him back into his cell, bruised and bloodied.

Nic waited for him there, all tenderness and warmth. Nic held him through the pain and told him how brave and clever he'd been. When a guard brought a tray of food some hours later, Nic coaxed him to eat. When the alpha guards passed by on their next patrol, Nic crouched over him, growling to scare them off. They laughed as they walked away, but Wolfe knew forced laughter covering fear when he heard it. When the guards had gone, Nic curled around him again, and for the first time in months, he heard himself purring.

When the nausea came, Nic held back his hair and rubbed his back while he crouched over the bucket. Nic pleaded with him to eat, praising him when he kept food down. Nic promised he would be all right, and he believed it.

Of course, such comfort could never last. Wolfe woke in the night to find Qualls in his cell. From the end of the hall, he could hear screaming. Nic was gone.

Another scream rang out, and Wolfe knew where his beloved was.

Qualls crouched beside him and brushed tangles of hair out of his eyes. "I am not here to hurt you, Scholar Wolfe. I only need to ask you some questions."

Nic screamed again.

"No, please, don't hurt him," Wolfe whimpered, flinching away from the touch. Moving even that much made his stomach clench.

Qualls frowned, laying his hand on Wolfe's cheek. "Who, Scholar? Who do you not want me to hurt?"

"Nic. Please, just leave him alone, he didn't do anything wrong. Don't hurt him."

"Is that so? Tell me, then. Tell me everything you know about him, and you may prove his innocence."

Wolfe's heart cried out to do as the torturer asked and tell him about Nic. But his mind knew better. His mind recognized the trap, and there was enough of it left to steel his heart. Qualls would twist his words, use them to incriminate Nic the same way they'd taken an invention intended to save the Library and twisted it into an act of heresy. Speaking would only make Nic's suffering worse. Locking his jaw, he thrashed away from the hand on his cheek, swallowing the acid that welled up as his stomach protested the sudden movement. Nausea swelled, and he coughed, choked, spit out his stomach's meager contents.

Qualls stood and stepped back, shaking his head. "Still so stubborn. I see that more extreme measures will be necessary, yet again. Rest well, Scholar Wolfe. We will begin in the morning."

There was no hope of sleep, not with Nic's screams echoing off the walls. He spent the night at the bars, crying and pleading to every guard that passed, begging them to take him instead.

In the morning, marked by a slight brightening of the glows, they did.

Qualls brought him to the room at the end of the hall so many times over the next weeks, he wasn't even sure when he lost the pregnancy. There was so much blood, so much pain. The only consolation was that Nic remained in their cell, wounded, but safe from further torture. Nic was there to hold him, so he could suffer for them both.

* * *

_**June, 2030** _

For a while, Wolfe thought his cycles might have stopped. He'd lost track of time, but it seemed that a lot of it had passed since his last heat. He was weak. Underweight. Often sick. Even more often wounded. Any of those things could have stopped a heat from coming.

Occasionally, he worried that he was still pregnant. But his body didn't change. His abdomen didn't swell. He felt nothing kicking inside him, not while waking. His nightmares were another matter.

In his nightmares, something grew inside him and devoured him from within with gnawing teeth, one organ at a time.

In better dreams, Nic was there to hold him, and he was home again, safe, his wounds gone. Sometimes, those dreams followed him into the waking world. Sometimes, he could believe in the illusions and take comfort in them.

Other times, when the madness receded, he knew every comfort was a mere hallucination, and only the pain was real. He could only be grateful that his body was too broken for his hormones to make the pain worse.

But his cycles had always been irregular, especially when separated from Nic, and after what seemed like a very long time, his heat came again.

When his skin burned and fluid soaked his ragged clothes, the guards brought him to the comfortable room again. This time, Qualls was there at the table, waiting while the guards helped Wolfe into the chair on the other side of the table. Weak as he was, he wouldn't have been able to get there without leaning on their arms. His entire body still hurt from his last beating.

The guards left, and Qualls poured him a cup of tea. "Go ahead and drink, Scholar Wolfe," he said, sliding the cup across the table. "It isn't drugged this time. I think we can discuss this reasonably, don't you?"

Wolfe didn't answer. He hadn't spoken in weeks. Wasn't sure he could anymore. Didn't want to find out.

But he did take the cup and drink. The usual black Assam, not laced with anything he could taste. He had to pick his battles now, with so little strength remaining.

"You may not believe me, Scholar Wolfe, but I truly have no desire to hurt you. In fact, I would prefer to do this gently. I regret that your stubbornness has forced my hand toward harsher measures so often," Qualls said, pausing for a drink of his tea and looking at Wolfe expectantly.

Wolfe said nothing. But he did eat one of the sweet rolls from the plate on the table. He needed food. He never knew when he would be allowed to eat again. He chewed quickly, barely tasting it, and started on another.

"But I hope that you will be more cooperative today. I have not brought you here to hurt you, Scholar, but to offer you relief." Qualls stood and walked around the table to stand beside Wolfe's chair. Offering his hands, he said, "Come to bed with me. I will ease the pain of your heat."

Crossing his arms over his chest, Wolfe looked away. He didn't want that. The very suggestion made his skin crawl, and he would have said so, had he been able to find the words to speak.

"Or perhaps you would prefer the ministrations of an alpha?" Qualls asked. "I can call for the guards. They will not be as kind as I, but perhaps that is what you require."

Bile rose in Wolfe's throat. The guards had been so brutal, the last time. He hadn't even been able to stand after they were through with him. He couldn't survive that again, not in his current state. He had to pick his battles. He turned, looking up into the torturer's cold eyes.

"Well?" Qualls asked. "Will you accept my generous offer?"

Wolfe reached for his torturer's hands.

* * *

_ **Alexandria** _

_ **July, 2030** _

Home smelled like Nic. The rich smoky cedar scent, undercut with the tang of sweat and the musk of sex, soaked into everything. The walls themselves smelled of it, and the bed was so suffused that Wolfe felt drunk from lying in it. When the painkillers were working well, he rolled in it, burrowing his face into the pillows and tangling himself in the sheets, luxuriating in the way it mingled with his own sandalwood and parchment.

He could pick up lingering traces of his own scent as well. On the couch, especially, where no clothes or covers had come between his body and the cushions at times. In the mattress, too. Not so much in his pillow; that mostly smelled of Nic. He imagined Nic holding that pillow at night to breathe in his scent, and his heart ached.

Nic was trying to be strong, but Wolfe could see the strain in him, at least at more lucid moments. When the past closed in, he could see nothing else. But when his mind was his own, he saw the dark circles under Nic's eyes and the haphazard shaving of Nic's beard. He felt the tension in the arms that wrapped around him, sometimes. Saw the tears, shed or unshed. That anguish made his recovery all the more urgent. He hated to cause Nic pain.

His own pain, he could bear. As the days passed, it lessened, until he could stand again, even walk as far as the bathroom without Nic's help, so long as he leaned on the wall for support. That was getting increasingly important. The nausea was getting worse.

He knew what it meant. He'd known since before he left the prison that he had conceived again, and though he didn't know quite how long it had been since that night with Qualls, he knew the thing inside him would only grow bigger as time went on.

The memory of that night made him burn with shame every time he thought of it. He tried not to think about it, but Qualls waited in his nightmares. Qualls, and the creature inside him. Qualls might have set him free, but the torturer had left a lingering trace of himself that Wolfe could not free himself of. Utterly irrational to think of a mere embryo in that way, but he couldn't stop himself. Not when his body ached in preparation to rearrange itself, not when he found himself hunched in front of the toilet, retching long past the point when his stomach was empty. Not with the knowledge that every option for getting the thing out of him meant more pain. Qualls had ensured that he would continue to suffer long past the day of his release.

It was clear that Nic did not suspect anything. He swallowed rut-blocking pills every morning, heedless of how unnecessary they were. He still held Wolfe as if Wolfe was his and his alone, as if Wolfe hadn't given himself to another. He still put his teeth to Wolfe's neck, gently reasserting his claim with bites that filled Wolfe with tangled relief and guilt.

It felt so good to be Nic's again, even if he didn't deserve it.

On an evening when the nausea and the pain didn't trouble him too badly, he let Nic help him to the couch, where he sat sipping mint tea and reading, both tasks he could accomplish if he used both his broken hands together to accomplish what he used to be able to do with only one. While Nic went to the kitchen to finish preparing dinner, Wolfe read books on omega anatomy and pregnancy, trying to map the dimensions of his problem. His Codex hadn't been returned when he was released, so he used Nic's to request the books, quietly hoping that Nic might check his reading history and learn the awful truth that way. He thought of leaving the Blanks filled for Nic to see, even of working up enough courage to show Nic the pages, but each time Nic came out of the kitchen to check on him, panic flared, and he wiped the pages clear. He considered writing, too, but his broken hands struggled to hold a pen, and the marks he could produce on the page looked more like a child's scribbles than the letters of any language.

Nic came out of the kitchen with bowls of soup, and Wolfe waved for him to put them on the table. He could walk the few steps from the couch to a chair and eat a dignified meal for a change. After putting the bowls down, Nic went back into the kitchen, returning with bread and another pot of tea just as Wolfe got settled in his chair. Wolfe missed the days when dinner came with wine. He missed the days when dinner meant more variety than soup and bread, too, but his stomach would tolerate little else. At least Nic had added a hint of spice to the lentil soup. Not nearly as much as Wolfe liked, but better than the bland broths he had been restricted to a week ago. He held the spoon himself, a hard-won gain after more than a week of having to let Nic feed him.

They ate in silence. Unavoidable, when Wolfe couldn't find his voice. Sometimes Nic filled the space with one-sided conversation, but more often, they simply watched each other. Nic's face was still a marvel to behold, even tired and unshaven. When he caught Wolfe's eye, he smiled, bright as a ray of sunlight. Wolfe smiled back, trying to put his gratitude for everything Nic was doing for him into the expression.

The soup went down well. Too well. The nausea came without warning, sending Wolfe staggering to his feet, his hand clamped over his mouth, struggling to get himself free of the chair. Nic hurried to his side, spoon clattering to the floor, and guided him to the bathroom with an arm around his waist. They made it to the toilet, barely, with Wolfe's legs going weak as soon as they got there. He crumpled, his whole body shaking, guts turning themselves inside out, while Nic held his hair and rubbed his back until the spasms calmed.

All the strength had gone out of Wolfe's limbs, leaving him sitting there helpless and trembling, tears running down his cheeks. His throat burned. Nic knelt beside him to wipe his face clean with a warm cloth and brought him a glass of water to rinse his mouth, murmuring reassurances in Italian. With Nic's arm around him, he stood just long enough to brush his own teeth, but he had to let Nic carry him to bed.

Nic brought a piece of bread and a cup of tea, after he had Wolfe settled in the bed, but even the sight of food was enough to turn his stomach. He rolled away, and Nic settled in behind him, nuzzling the back of his neck. Wolfe stretched his neck out, and Nic took the hint, giving him a soft and soothing bite.

"_Amore mio_," Nic whispered, his breath warm against Wolfe's neck. "Rest. Let your stomach settle. I am here." He wrapped an arm around to take Wolfe's hand, stroking the palm with his thumb in a slow, rhythmic motion.

A purr rumbled in Wolfe's chest, and an answering one in his partner's. He leaned back against his alpha, letting the security of the embrace and the smell of cedar soak into him until he could sleep.

For once, Wolfe's dreams were quiet. Or if they were bad, at least he forgot them before he woke.

A small blessing, considering that he woke in pain. Not the usual aches of his broken body, but a deep pain in his stomach and lower back that made him curl into a ball, whimpering. A pain he wished he didn't remember, though he did.

A hand shoved into his pants confirmed it. Blood, metallic-smelling and wet on his fingers. Bright red in the light when he opened his eyes.

There was so much light. Glows shining, sunbeams from the windows. Bathed in such brightness, everything looked as hazy as a dream.

He remembered coming home to Nic, being cared for, healing, but the pain told him he was wrong. He couldn't trust what he thought he was seeing, then. He wanted to trust what he was smelling, Nic's scent, but he'd been deceived before. He wouldn't trust it again.

He could trust the pain. The pain was always real. It came in waves of intensity, mild swelling to severe and declining again.

Footsteps in the hall warned him of the torturer's approach. It could only be Qualls. Nothing else made sense. There were extra blankets on the bed, so he pulled them over himself. They might be figments of his imagination, but he would take the chance. If they were real, they might hide him.

The door opened on smooth, well-oiled hinges. No clatter of bars or locks. Maybe he was in _that_ room, then. That explained the soft bed, the blankets, the smell of cedar.

He knew, then, what Qualls had planned for him. He wouldn't give in. Not this time. He inhaled deeply, drawing what strength he could from the scent surrounding him, from the memory of Nic, and he tried to ignore the pain.

The footsteps came nearer. He squeezed his eyes shut and held perfectly still, not even breathing.

"Chris? I brought you breakfast."

He couldn't hold back his anguished howl. How could his mind do this to him? How could it torment him with the sound of Nic's voice when Qualls stood at his side?

A hand came to rest on his shoulder, and he jerked away from it, howling again. Frantic, he swung at it, trying to drive it away. His heart raced, and his chest went tight with panic, all while a wave of pain in his abdomen crested. His arms flailed again, hitting nothing but air.

The footsteps retreated.

"I'm sorry. I'll leave you alone. I'll come back later."

That voice. Gods, that voice. It pulled at his heart as if to tear it apart.

The door closed with a soft click.

Sobbing, he curled into a ball beneath the blankets. He knew what was coming. Qualls would call in the guards. The pain he was feeling already was nothing compared to the agony they would inflict. But it was already too late to surrender. He couldn't call out for Qualls. He couldn't apologize to him. He couldn't beg. His tongue no longer knew how to form the words, even if he were that far fallen. Gods, he was glad he would never know if he could fall that far.

Clutching a pillow to his face, he gasped in as deep a breath he could, drawing in the cedar scent that soaked it, and he called on his memories of Nic. The illusion settled around him, almost tangible, and it held him while he cried.


	4. Alexandria

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> More comfort in this chapter, but it's still pretty heavy on the angst.

_ **July, 2030** _

In the first weeks after Christopher's return from the hell he'd spent the past year in, Santi feared the coming of his lover's heat. Often, after a long separation, merely seeing each other again was enough to bring on heat in Chris, and the smell of his pheromones would send Santi into a matching rut. It made reunions most enjoyable, under normal circumstances, as weeks apart gave way to days in bed, their bodies entangled as they made up for lost time.

Chris's body wouldn't be able to withstand such coupling now. He wasn't even well enough to safely take heat-blocking medication. Though his fever had passed and his wounds were healing, he still struggled with food after being starved. It was hard, sometimes, for him to keep anything down, and he was barely regaining weight. The best Santi could do to avert disaster was to take his own pills, which rendered him as insensible to omega pheromones as a beta. It wouldn't do a thing for Christopher's misery if his heat came on, but at least it would keep Santi from losing control and hurting him.

The Medica who came to examine Chris suggested that he was too unwell to go into heat, and Santi hoped that was true. He hoped a lot of things as he sat at Chris's side, tending to his needs. He hoped Chris would recover fully. He hoped Chris would speak again. He hoped Chris would sleep, and he hoped that when Chris opened his eyes, he would know where he was and who he was with.

He didn't always. Sometimes, he woke screaming with wild-eyed fear and struggled against any effort Santi made to help him. He resisted meals and baths and even medicine when those moods struck, and the only thing that seemed to help was to wait it out.

Sitting outside the door during the most recent of these episodes, Santi was certain things were as bad as they could get. Chris lay screaming and sobbing in their bed, and Santi could not even go to comfort him without inspiring worse terror. All he could do was sit there on the floor outside the door, watching the tray of breakfast he'd brought grow cold and waiting for the cries beyond the door to quiet.

It hurt. It felt like rejection, even knowing that Chris was trapped in the past, seeing not his home and partner but the horrors he had endured. Santi hated those selfish feelings. But at least, he told himself, this was the worst of it. From here, Chris had to get better.

Time dragged on, and slowly, the sounds from the bedroom calmed from howls to sobs to sniffles to silence. After a few long minutes of silence, Santi took the tray and entered the bedroom, as slow and nonthreatening as he could be. Chris was asleep again, curled in the bed with his arms wrapped tightly around a sweat-soaked pillow. The blankets, too, were damp, and Santi put down the tray of food to change them. If he was careful, he could switch out the blankets without disturbing his partner's rest. Chris didn't move as Santi peeled back the blankets, lifting them away from his shoulders, his chest, his hips.

And then he saw the blood.

He'd seen blood often enough in his line of work that he thought himself accustomed to it. He knew what to do for an injured soldier. But he froze at the sight of the ring of blood spreading out from around Christopher's hips.

There was just so much of it.

God, Chris didn't have that much blood to lose, did he?

The cuts on his stomach, Santi thought. Chris must have torn them open again. His nails were all gone, but that didn't stop him from tearing at his wounds, and even blunted fingertips could do real damage.

But, no, the blood was too low for that. There was only one thing it could be.

Santi thought he might vomit. Thank God he'd been through enough war zones to master that instinct. He took out his Codex and scribbled a quick message, and by the time it was sent, his stomach was settled, though guilt and rage remained.

He hadn't even thought, hadn't considered the possibility. The vomiting... he should have known. _Cazzo Madre di Dio_, he should have known.

Rape was so far beyond the realm of honorable conduct that Santi hadn't considered it as a possibility, even as he saw the evidence that Christopher's captors had been vile enough to do such a thing written in the marks on his lover's skin. They'd carved words into his flesh. Burned him. What wouldn't they do? And yet, he remembered being lectured, as a young alpha, on the importance of controlling his urges, keeping himself from rut. He remembered High Garda training to withstand his own instincts if ever he found himself cut off from supplies of blocking medication. He knew the disciplinary codes for unwanted sexual contact, the strictness of the penalties. But then, physical assault carried strict penalties, too. And Christopher's captors had clearly been granted free reign to do that.

Looking down at Chris on the bed, not asleep as Santi had thought, but curled in silent misery with eyes shut as if to block out some unseen terror, images flashed through Santi's mind. Chris, helpless and broken, overcome by his heat. His tormentors looming over him. They were all alphas in Santi's mind, though he recognized that as irrational. Betas and omegas with the right parts could cause a pregnancy just as easily. It might have been even more painful for Chris that way, without the relief of an alpha's knot.

He blinked the images away. No good to think of that. Chris didn't need his fury. He tossed the bloodied blankets to the floor, and when Chris didn't flinch at that, he reached down to touch Chris's shoulder. "Love, are you with me?"

Such heartbreaking anguish in those watery brown eyes. Chris bit his lip as he looked up at Santi and dipped his head in a fraction of a nod.

Dropping to one knee, Santi brought himself to eye level with his partner and brushed back the sweaty hair from his face. "You're bleeding," he said, as gently as he could, locking away all the rage he felt toward the ones who had caused this. He needed to be steady now, or they would both shatter. "Having cramps?"

Another tiny nod, one that sent a tear trickling down to land on the already damp pillow.

Something in the look of Chris's face, a hint of resignation along with the pain, made Santi hazard a guess. "This isn't the first time."

It should have been. Chris had never been pregnant before his disappearance. He'd never wanted to be. Even when they entertained thoughts of children, he'd always said he would prefer to adopt. He hadn't even agreed to share a heat together until after they'd both had contraceptive injections, and he made sure they both kept up with those injections on the required schedule. If there was even a chance he might miss a dose, he used heat blockers. Once, when a delay on a mission had left them with neither medication, Chris had opted to suffer through his heat alone rather than trust a condom. Chris was very, very careful about pregnancy. He should never have been pregnant even this once, let alone...

Chris squeezed his eyes shut, setting more tears free, and lowered his chin to his chest. An affirmative.

Santi would kill them. He would track down everyone responsible for this and tear them limb from limb. He would castrate them with his bare hands. He would...

Chris jerked away, groaning in pain as he did. Wide, terrified eyes watched Santi as if expecting him to strike.

"Oh, Chris, I'm sorry, I didn't mean..." Santi forced his fists to unclench, his shoulders to relax. He forced the rage back into its vault within his heart, fought the instinct to wrap Chris in his arms, and sat back on his heels. He took a deep breath, and he spoke slowly, evenly. "I am not angry with you. I am angry with the ones who hurt you. Never with you. I will never, ever hurt you. I swear to you, I will keep you safe. Do you need me to leave?" Those last words were the hardest, and he had to speak around a lump forming in his throat, but he got them out. He hated the very thought of leaving Chris alone and bleeding, but it would be impossible to help with Chris fighting him. He might even make matters worse.

Wary brown eyes watched him for a long moment before Chris reached out a trembling hand.

Santi took it. "We should check to see how bad the bleeding is. I've contacted a Medica, but I don't know how soon she can get here. Can I take you to the bathroom to clean you up and check the bleeding?"

Chris's brows drew together as he considered that, but before he could reach an answer, his face scrunched in pain and he moaned, curling into a ball on his side again.

A contraction. That was a contraction. Santi hadn't seen one before, only read about them in books and overheard talk of them between new parents among friends and family. He remembered an aunt telling him that rubbing her partner's back through contractions had helped, so he did that for Chris, putting firm pressure on Chris's lower back, near where he thought the pain might be. Fortunately the spot was free of recent injuries, below the still-healing lash marks that scored his upper back. Chris groaned, leaning into the touch while muscles he'd never used, never wanted to use, worked to push out...

What was it, at this stage? Only blood? Christopher's abdomen hadn't yet swollen, so he couldn't be far along. The life growing in him couldn't yet look human. It might still be too small to see.

God, Santi hoped it would be too small to see.

The contraction lasted no more than a minute, and when it was done, Chris relaxed. Meeting Santi's eyes, he waved a hand in the direction of the bathroom and nodded.

Santi tried not to let his relief at that show too clearly.

* * *

Later, when the Medica had come and gone, and Chris lay in sedated sleep, dressed in absorbent new underwear and tucked between clean sheets, Santi dragged a training dummy out to the courtyard and beat it until his knuckles bled. He couldn't drive the images from his mind. Chris held down, chained down. Beaten, bleeding, struggling, crying. Violated.

More than once.

He gave the dummy a savage kick, watched it crumple to the ground, and kicked it again.

It could have been as many as three or four times, the Medica had said, if Chris's heat cycles were normal and the pregnancies ended quickly enough. There was no way to know. When it ended so early, pregnancy left no trace. No way to know, either, what might have happened while he wasn't in heat and couldn't conceive. He tested negative for venereal disease, which might be a good sign.

But then, he'd tested negative for pregnancy the day after he came home, too. His hormone levels had probably been too low to register on the test. Not unexpected, given his overall condition. The pregnancy would never have survived.

(The child, had it survived, would have been Santi's by law if not by blood. He didn't know why he thought of that. Chris would never have wanted it.)

Dropping to his knees, he wrapped his hands around the dummy's neck, squeezing the life from it, lifting its head to slam back down against the cobblestones.

The thing came to pieces under his hands, but he kept on, slamming his fists into the scraps of fabric and stuffing.

He would learn who they were. He would hunt them down. He would kill them.

But as the rage wore itself out, the images in his mind shifted. There were other scenarios, other possibilities the Medica had suggested to him in hushed whispers by the front door, where Christopher couldn't hear.

He saw Christopher in a bed, crying, pleading, his body positioned willingly as he begged for relief. Christopher in a cell, clinging with desperate need to another prisoner, an alpha as battered and bloodstained as he was.

_Even if he offered himself to them, that doesn't mean he truly wanted them._

Santi stood, kicking away the remains of the dummy, dying rage curdling into bitter guilt. Chris had needed him, and he wasn't there. Not to protect him, not to comfort him, not to complete him.

He had given up. While Chris was suffering, he had given up. When Chris needed him so badly, he had given up.

His hands bled, and the pain was not nearly enough. Christopher's hands were so much worse. Broken fingers, missing nails. Santi deserved those. He might have inflicted those wounds on himself if he didn't need his hands to care for Chris.

Chris. He had to be there for Chris. It was the only penance he could offer for his abandonment.

He went inside. Checked on Chris, still asleep. Stood under a shower cold enough to freeze his thoughts until his head ached and his skin was numb. When he returned to the bedroom to bandage his hands, Chris was stirring, mumbling in his sleep. The language wasn't one that Santi knew, but the tone was frantic, terrified.

Santi climbed into bed beside his partner and wrapped an arm around to rub his back, hoping the soft touch would be enough to ease him out of his nightmare. He would come back to reality better if he was woken gently. Slowly, too slowly, Chris calmed, quieted. His eyes fluttered open.

Chris's hand went to his stomach, and he grimaced, closing his eyes. When he opened them again, the look in them made Santi feel his heart might tear in two. Patting his stomach, Chris looked at Santi as if wordlessly confessing some grave sin.

Santi put a hand over Christopher's on his stomach and kissed his forehead. "No, my love. Don't apologize to me. You did nothing wrong."

Pressing his head against Santi's chest, Chris shook with a sob.

Feeling as helpless as he'd felt the day he agreed to stop searching for Chris, Santi pulled his lover close and stroked his hair, still tied back, but tangled and coming loose. His hand itched to reach for Chris's brush and set it right, maybe put it in a braid. But Chris wouldn't welcome the pulling right now.

"_Amore mio_," he said, hearing the waver in his voice. He took a steadying breath. He couldn't sound uncertain, not if he was going to reassure Chris. "I don't know what happened to you there. I don't need to. But I promise you, I do not blame you for any of it. Even if you tell me you willingly sought another alpha, I would not blame you. I would be glad that you found some measure of comfort in that awful place." He could keep his voice steady, but he couldn't stop his tears. "The only one I blame is myself. I should have been there. You needed me, and _I wasn't there._ I abandoned you, and I can only pray that you can find it in your heart to forgive me for that."

He didn't deserve the love he saw on Christopher's face. The sympathy. He didn't deserve the kiss that Chris pulled his head in for, but oh, it what a kiss it was. Their first since Chris's return. Warm and slow and sweet.

Chris was the one to break the kiss, and when he did, he brushed loose strands of hair from his shoulder and tilted his head to offer his neck to Santi's teeth. An instinctive move, when made by an omega in heat, but entirely purposeful now.

The sight of it called to Santi on a primal level. Even with the blocking medicine in his system, when they were this close, he could smell traces of sandalwood and parchment, and the scent made his instincts scream at him to mark Chris and claim him as his own. Chris was _asking_ to be claimed, and the possessive, protective rage that still smoldered in Santi wanted to stake that claim with a savage bite. Not an urge that should be indulged. Grateful for his High Garda training in controlling his instincts, Santi put his teeth to Christopher's neck for a gentle, comforting bite. Something to reassure him he was loved, wanted. The same kind of bite he'd been giving Chris every time Chris showed his neck since coming home.

His lover's frustrated growl caught him by surprise. The hand pushing on the back of his head surprised him even more, though its intent was clear enough.

Santi let his teeth press in harder, deeper, urged on by Chris's whines and growls and the pressure of Chris's hand. He tasted blood before Chris let out a satisfied sigh and released his grip. 

The wild part of him reveled in the taste. His omega's blood. _His_. His mark, bright and red on Christopher's skin.

The more rational part of his mind quaked with fear at the degree of trust Chris had just placed in him. He didn't deserve it. He'd failed Chris. He didn't deserve to taste his skin, let alone his blood. He didn't deserve to leave a mark so deep.

Very gently, he licked the imprints left by his teeth. Kissed the mark. Nuzzled it. All while Chris cuddled against him, purring.

He added antibiotic ointment, too; Chris was at enough risk of infection already. But Chris seemed better now. Not healthy yet by a long shot, but more at ease, as if a burden had been lifted from him.

Humbling to know he could have such an effect.

Lying on his back, Santi pulled Chris closer until Chris's head rested on his chest. The purring grew louder at that, and soon his own joined it. With his fingers in Chris's hair, Santi felt almost at peace. Chris might be badly wounded, but at least Santi knew the worst of it now, and he knew what comfort he could give. Things would get better from here. Chris would heal, and Santi would be with him, every step of the way.


	5. Alexandria

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This one is comfort and a lot of sexual tension. No Rome flashbacks.

**December, 2030**

At the sound of the alarm clock, Santi reached out and silenced the noise without opening his eyes. Stretching, he rolled to embrace Chris, only to find his partner's side of the bed empty. Smells of coffee and spices drifted in the air, overlaying the mingled cedar and sandalwood of their bed. Unusual, but not as much as it had been before Christopher's disappearance. Sometimes, when he had a hard time sleeping, Chris liked to do something that made him feel useful. Barred from research and publication, "useful" for him now meant domestic tasks, mostly. By the smell of it, he'd chosen to make another attempt at cooking this morning. That wasn't as frightening a prospect as it might have been for another meal. He could make a passable breakfast now, and a good cup of coffee.

Santi dressed and shaved with his usual efficiency and found Chris putting plates of food and cups of coffee on the table. Already dressed in a Scholar's robe, Chris looked lively enough, greeting Santi with a warm smile. No sign of weariness or tremors in his movements, and he gave a little purr when Santi pulled him in for a kiss and a quick nip on the neck before sitting down at the table.

"What have I done to deserve this?" Santi asked as Chris took his seat on the other side of the table. 

"Putting up with me is worthy of the occasional breakfast, is it not?" Chris's tone was light, but there was a wariness to his expression that put Santi's nerves on edge. It could be paranoia, or difficulty holding onto reality, or any of the lingering tendrils of madness that still caught Christopher in their grasp more often than either of them would like. It could as easily be worry that he'd disturbed Santi's sleep with his nighttime distress or concern that he'd overspiced the beans or overcooked the eggs.

That, at least, was a concern that would be easy enough to dispel. The _ful medames _tasted good enough, if heavy and savory for Santi's decidedly Italian tastes in breakfast. Two decades in Alexandria, and he still hadn't quite acquired the local tastes in breakfast fare. Biscotti and coffee made a perfectly adequate morning meal, as far as he was concerned. He was glad enough to cater to his partner's preferences, though, and kept beans and eggs ready in the icebox for when Chris wanted a heartier breakfast than the coffee cakes and sweet breads they usually compromised on.

But before he could assure Chris that he'd done well with the _ful,_ Chris's hand strayed to the package of heat-blocking pills on the table next to his plate. The same ones he'd picked up from the pharmacy yesterday, which Santi had carefully avoided commenting on. Chris didn't like being praised for completing simple tasks, even when those tasks represented real progress in his recovery.

"I'm thinking about stopping these," Chris said, looking up at Santi to gauge his reaction.

That was... unexpected. To say the least. Considering the hell Chris had been through, Santi had accepted that his partner might never want to experience a heat again. He tried not to let himself grieve that too much. The loss of the pleasure and connection they shared during Christopher's heats was a small enough price to pay for having Chris home and safe and sane. But he missed it. God, he missed it. Just the thought of it had his pulse pounding in his groin.

Santi kept his eyes on his plate and schooled his face into a calm expression. There could be a perfectly reasonable explanation. "Side effects getting to you?" he asked. Before his disappearance, the pills had given Chris headaches when he stayed on them too long. Reduced his interest in sex as well, though that was far from their most urgent concern anymore.

Chris shook his head, making his hair sway around his neck in a way that Santi had always found alluring. "I want to try a heat." He paused, brows drawing together as he considered his words. "To see if I can. To prove that I can."

A rush of mixed terror and excitement made it nearly impossible to keep a straight face. So much could go wrong. Memories, pain, fear... Not pregnancy. Even on heat blockers, Chris insisted they get their contraceptive injections on schedule. But so much could go right. The depth of their connection during heat might well be a salve for Christopher's trauma. Santi made himself chew his mouthful of beans very slowly before saying, "You'll be wanting me to plan for time off, then?"

There was a long pause. Christopher's hand, still resting on the table, started to shake. "I... Please... Don't think me cruel for asking this of you, Niccolo..." He extended his shaking hand, eyes downcast.

Santi took the outstretched hand in his. "You'd rather do it alone?" Disappointing as it was, Santi could understand that desire. Heat was a vulnerable time. Of course it might be a step too far to share it when Chris didn't yet know how his body, changed as it was by his ordeal, would respond.

Chris's hand tightened around his. "I want you there. More than anything. But... I want to refrain from copulation. If you would find the discomfort of that too great..."

"It won't be so bad. I can go back on my pills." He would have agreed to anything to wipe that anguished expression from his lover's face. Going back on his blocking pills was an inconvenience, nothing more. He and Chris had been together long enough that other omegas' scents had little effect on him anymore without prolonged exposure, so he'd stopped the pills to take advantage of his heightened alpha sense of smell while his company was assigned to investigate suspected Burner hideouts. But there were other alphas and omegas in the company to do the job.

"Yes. Yes, of course," Chris said. Letting go of Santi's hand, he picked up his fork again and stirred the eggs and beans around on his plate.

"Don't worry, love, I'll do anything you need me to do to help you through it," Santi said, wishing the clock didn't show that he was due at the barracks so soon. He would have liked to sit with Chris and plan things out, but instead, he gulped down the rest of his coffee and stood to walk around the table and pull Chris into a quick embrace. "I'll tell Zara to expect me to take time off soon, and I'll pick up an extra pack of my pills on my way home, just in case. Anything you need?"

Chris looked up at him, with the look on his face that he got after working out some difficult puzzle. "Hmm. I'd like a fur blanket to wrap up in, and I'd rather not ruin the one from Russia. See if there's anything of the sort to be had?"

Fur. In Alexandria, where even at this time of year, the nights were not so very cold. He would likely have to scour the entire market district, but there was no question that he would do it. Chris needed to be comfortable. Leaning in to nuzzle his lover's neck and breathe in his scent unimpaired one last time, he murmured, "Anything for you, _amore mio._"

* * *

The average time for an omega to go into heat after stopping heat-blocking medication was two weeks. The average time for an omega in a committed relationship with an alpha to go into heat after stopping heat-blocking medication was one week. But Christopher Wolfe had never been a patient man, and he was often in the habit of doing things before he was expected to, so Santi was not especially surprised when he came home three days later to find Christopher sweaty-faced and putting a protective sheet on the bed, the smell of sandalwood and parchment so thick in the air that he could smell it even with the blocking pills in his system.

As always, Santi walked with heavy enough footsteps for Chris to hear him coming, but Chris remained absorbed in his task, giving Santi a chance to write a quick note to his lieutenants that he would be off for the next few days. With Chris resolute in his plan to go through the heat without sex, it could be a long one. Putting his Codex away, he leaned against the door frame to watch his lover preparing the bed. He was still dressed in a Scholar's robe, though he had loose and comfortable clothes on under it, and the black silk swirled around him as he moved from closet to bed, adding the dark red silk sheets that he liked to use in heat. A color that looked stunning against his skin, and one that hid stains tolerably well. Over the sheets went the fur blanket he'd asked for, and then the pillows, all of them strong with Santi's scent after he'd spent the past nights sleeping on top of them at his lover's request.

_All worth it to keep Chris comfortable._

Chris had his hair up in a bun, with just a few curls coming loose, as if he'd tied it up in a hurry. That left his neck exposed, a sight Santi didn't let his eyes linger too long on. Even with his rut suppressed, he found that neck beautiful. It called to his lips, begging to be kissed. Shifting his eyes away from Chris's neck provided no relief, though, as they fell upon Chris's backside as he bent to pick a pillow up from the floor. Now there was another part of Chris he didn't need to be in rut to appreciate. A part he'd barely touched for a year and a half now.

How he wanted to drop to his knees behind Chris and lavish adoration on that ass. To massage it, to kiss the smooth skin, to lick up the fluids starting to flow from between the cheeks...

Santi turned away and pictured his childhood home as vividly as he could, the way he'd been trained to do, until his head was clear of forbidden thoughts. He couldn't allow himself any more such lapses in discipline now that Christopher's heat was beginning. When his pulse was calm and his thoughts firmly fixed on the task of caring for Chris, he entered the room and picked up a stray pillow to pass to his partner.

Taking the pillow to add to the arrangement on the bed, Chris said, "You're home early." Losing track of time. Hard to be sure whether that was the heat, trouble with memories, or Christopher's natural tendency to get so absorbed in a task that he forgot the world around him.

"It's past six," Santi said. "Want me to make dinner, or should I send for food and help you here?"

With the pillow in place, Chris stepped back to survey his work with a critical eye. "It's almost finished. You can cook. Hmm." Turning, he wrapped Santi in an embrace that turned to a downward slide to his knees. Rubbing his cheek against Santi's thigh, he said, "Let me take care of you first. Before I'm too far gone." One hand crept its way up toward Santi's belt.

_Think of father's kitchen. Think of the racks of spices over the counter. Think of the view from the window. _Seizing his partner's hand before it could go too far, Santi dropped to one knee and pulled Chris into his arms. When he kissed Chris on the forehead, the skin beneath his lips was hot. "Christopher, my love, you were very clear that you wanted no sexual activity during your heat. What you are offering would be sex."

With a little whine, Chris nuzzled Santi's neck. "I still have my wits about me, love. I can do something for you. It's the least I can do." It was only when he heard the language on Chris's lips that Santi realized he'd slipped into his native Italian.

Santi stood, pulling his partner up with him. "No," he said, switching back to Greek; best not to speak in a language Chris found as arousing as Italian. "I'm going to go cook. You need some nutrition in you before you get too far into this."

After a tense moment, Chris stepped back and nodded. "Yes. Thank you. I'll finish up here." He turned back to the bed to rearrange the pillows in a way that might have been omega fussiness, but might have just been an attempt to look busy.

Having always found the kitchen a soothing place, Santi was glad for the opportunity to retreat there into the familiar rhythms of chopping garlic and boiling water for pasta. He'd grown up watching his father in the kitchen, begging to help, even if it was only to stir the pot while his father added ingredient after ingredient, filling the kitchen with rich aromas. His father would, no doubt, be appalled by the meal he prepared that night, but he had no time for making pasta from scratch or browsing the market for fresh ingredients. No, it was a night to cook like his mother, ruthlessly efficient. Dried spaghetti went into one pot, cans of tomatoes, capers, and anchovies in the other. The pungent smell of the sauce purged his nose of the last traces of Chris's scent.

He didn't even smell Chris approaching, though he heard his footsteps. Chris stood in the kitchen door, sniffing the air with amusement in his eyes and a smile on his face. "You lecture me for offering you sexual favors, and then you prepare me _spaghetti alla puttanesca_? Terribly mixed messages you're sending, Niccolo darling."

Santi laughed. This particular recipe had become something of a running joke between them thanks to its name and history as a dish prepared by houses of prostitution to mask the smells of so many alphas and omegas coupling under one roof. He hadn't meant to do anything other than make an easy and nutritious meal the first time he'd cooked it for Chris, but it made Chris laugh, and that was cause enough to make a tradition of serving it before Chris's heat, as far as Santi was concerned.

"You read too much into things as always, my dear Scholar," Santi said in familiar refrain. "As I keep telling you, it is the _pasta_ that resembles a prostitute. These are very promiscuous noodles. You, love, are a paragon of chastity."

Chris snorted a laugh, but when he approached to take his plate, there was a seductive sway to his gait. Santi found that the wine needed a great deal of his attention to uncork.

The meal proceeded pleasantly enough, with only the sheen of sweat on Chris's face and a slight widening of his pupils to betray his condition, and Santi's thoughts staying focused on the conversation about the novel they'd just finished reading together. Chris, as usual, favored a more symbolic interpretation of the ending, while Santi maintained that the author had simply run out of ideas and made up the most outlandish thing possible. There was an aching nostalgia to the debate, a sense that the past year's pain had been wiped away, and they'd fallen back into the rhythms of their former lives.

It didn't last. It never did. The meal ended, and Chris stood, yawning and stretching in a way that put his ass far too much on display. "Have you reconsidered your stance on sleeping arrangements?" he asked.

They'd debated that matter a great deal over the past days, and no matter what Chris said, Santi had no intention of changing his stance. "No. The bed is yours, I'm taking the couch, and we're keeping the door shut. It's the only way to be safe."

"You know I don't sleep well alone."

Santi knew. God, did he know. But he also knew how fragile both their wills would be when they were both sleepy and their scents were so thick in the air. "You could take a sleeping pill."

"No!" The word came out as a growl. Chris wrapped his arms around himself, a tremor running through him. "I _will not_ do this with drugs in my blood. _No_."

The fear in his lover's voice froze Santi in his tracks. He'd expected irritation, even anger. Chris never liked the idea of having to rely on sleeping pills. But he didn't fear them. Not usually. Stammering apologies, Santi hurried to his side, offering his arms, wondering if the heat was already amplifying Chris's emotions. "You don't have to, love. Of course you don't. What about a cup of tea?"

Chris all but collapsed into his arms, the tremors intensifying. "No tea. _No._"

Resting his chin on the top of Christopher's head, well away from the fragrance of his neck, Santi rubbed his partner's back, murmuring, "I'm sorry. You don't have to have anything. You just tell me what you need. I am here." Even through the barrier of Chris's clothing, Santi could feel the warmth of his skin. He had to be more aroused than he was letting on. In better times, they would have already made love at least once by the time he got this warm.

"Bed," Chris mumbled, his face pressed against Santi's chest. "Take me to bed. Sit with me until I'm asleep. Please?"

That didn't seem to onerous a request to honor. True, taking Chris to this nest carried a risk, but nothing Santi couldn't manage. Chris's scent was getting stronger, but it wasn't overpowering the blockers yet. Santi still had on his uniform, complete with its belt that he knew for a fact Chris could not undo with shaking hands. He could get Chris there, get him comfortably tucked in, and, well, if Chris couldn't handle it, there was always the option of leaving.

"Come on," he said, soft and soothing. "Let's get you to bed."

With Chris weak and trembling, tucking him beneath his piles of blankets without getting aroused wasn't as much of a challenge as it otherwise might have been. Every time an inappropriate thought entered his mind, Santi had only to think of the cause of his partner's current distress, and his blood cooled. He sat at Chris's side, stroking his hair and waiting for his tremors to calm, studiously ignoring the movements of the covers lower on the bed. If Chris needed to shift his hips a bit to get them comfortable, that was his concern, not Santi's.

Santi wouldn't let himself dwell on the fact that not even two years ago, places far more intimate than Chris's hips would have been entirely his concern.

Long minutes passed, and Chris's body stilled. He seemed to be nearly asleep when his eyes opened and he looked up at Santi with his piercing gaze. "Nic?"

"Yes, _amore mio_?

"Would you do something for me? To put my mind at ease?"

The fragility of the hope in Christopher's voice made Santi's heart ache. Chris should never have had the slightest doubt that Santi would do anything he needed.

Giving his lover's shoulder a gentle squeeze, Santi said, "Of course. Anything for you, my love."

The corner of Chris's mouth turned up in a hint of a smile. "Untrue. You won't fuck me."

Santi kissed his forehead, hotter now than it had been earlier in the evening. This heat was coming on hard and fast. Not even a full day to go until the peak of it, at this rate. "Believe me, love, that is something I am doing for you. But allow me to rephrase: I will do anything that you have not already forbidden while you had a clearer head."

Chris considered him for a moment, his eyes searching. "Don't take your pill tomorrow."

An intellectual challenge. That was Santi's first though. Chris was challenging him, forcing him to think through this puzzle. Did skipping his pill constitute a forbidden action? They hadn't explicitly discussed his medication...

But no, there was nothing but sincerity on Christopher's face. None of the sly expression he got when he was trying to trap someone in their own logic. Chris genuinely wanted him to so something so utterly irrational.

Santi's thoughts raced, but the only think he could think of to say was, "Why?"

Chris reached for Santi's hand and held it. "By the end of this, I will know that I can withstand the demands of my body. That my will is my own. It would bring me great comfort to know that the same is true for you."

"Christopher, beloved..." Santi wanted to say that it was a mad scheme. That it was the influence of Chris's hormones speaking. Knowing such statements would likely anger his partner, he chose his next words carefully. "Your safety is my primary concern right now. If you want to see me go through a rut without indulging my instincts, I will gladly do it, but at another time, please."

"Don't you see?" Chris pleaded, pushing himself upright in the bed and clasping Santi's hand in both of his. "This is the only time it matters. I need to know, Nic. I need to know that even at the peak of heat and rut, we are no slaves to our instincts. You're trained in instinct control. Please, my love, let me see that training work."

It made horrible, terrifying sense, what Christopher asked. It was the sort of madness that tipped back over into sense. Chris's heats had probably been used against him. The ones who violated him might have blamed their own instincts for their actions. Of course he needed conclusive proof that it would never happen again. And that left Santi no choice but to look into his eyes and agree.

* * *

As he usually did, Santi woke well before his partner and made coffee. A large mug, just for himself, which he took out to the courtyard to drink in the fresh air, away from any tendrils of scent that might slip out from beneath the bedroom door. With his blocking medication wearing off, every scent seemed sharper, from the overgrown patches of mint and the sturdy rosemary bushes to the reek of a tomcat's spray in the alley beyond the wall and the ocean breeze that wafted across the city. The first step of avoiding loss of control in rut, he remembered from his training, was not to go into rut in the first place.

Easier said than done, of course. He would have to go back into the house eventually. But first, he put himself through a strenuous set of exercises, working his body until his muscles ached and his clothes were moist with sweat. That was the next step, to wear himself out enough that he would be less of a threat if he did go into rut.

When he went back inside for more coffee to quench his thirst, Chris was awake. Awake and in distress, judging by the howling sobs from the bedroom. The scent hit him before he was even halfway down the hall. Sandalwood and parchment, heavy enough that it seemed to coat his lungs, with the musky animal overtones of an omega nearing the peak of heat. Chris would be slick and open, hot and ready. Santi could almost see him, on hands and knees, presenting his ass to be fucked, squirming and panting and pleading.

He was hard. Engorged and straining against the uniform trousers he still had on from the night before. Unacceptable.

Leaning against the wall, Santi forced his breathing to slow and went through his visualization exercises. First thoughts of innocence and family. His childhood home. His parents and brother. Every room of the house he'd grown up in.

His cock still yearned to be sunk into Christopher's heat.

Time for the next level of visualizations, then. Faith and duty. Christ on the cross. The Archives. The soldiers of his company. The ones he didn't find attractive, at least. Not Zara.

That did the trick. The image of the great shelves filled with knowledge he'd vowed to defend got him soft again. He counted five more breaths before he approached the closed bedroom door. There he paused again, hand raised to knock.

His very blood sang out for him to open that door and take Christopher in his arms, though his baser instincts wanted to do very different things from there than his higher mind did. There was a procedure for these kinds of situations, drilled into him in grueling exercises with the other alpha recruits. Failure would have meant dismissal from the High Garda; they had no use for soldiers without self control.

First, assess urgency. Chris crying was urgent enough, as far as Santi was concerned. Next, assess his own motives. _Are you thinking with the head on your shoulders or the one in your pants, _as his training sergeant used to say. Both, honestly, but mostly the one on his shoulders. He was soft still, breathing through his mouth with one hand over his face to make sure he stayed that way. Despite the constant whisper of his instincts in the back of his mind, what he wanted most was to help Chris fight off whatever memory had its claws in him.

Fixing the image of the Archives in his mind, he knocked and called out, "Christopher? All right?"

The sobbing stopped. There was a long silence, and then the shuffle of feet on the floor. "Nic?" A choked breath. "Gods, Nic, is it you?" The sound of hands hitting the door, a body sliding down to land on the floor beside it.

Only the door stood between them. He could be there, holding Chris, reassuring him. Santi's cock twitched, helpfully reminding him that it could be very comforting to an omega in heat.

Not this time. All it could do this time was irreparably shatter Christopher's trust in him. Digging his nails into his palms, he pictured the Archives again. Books. Rows and rows of books.

"I'm here, Chris. What's wrong?" His voice came out huskier than he would have liked. Tendrils of sandalwood and parchment crept around the hand pressed over his nose.

A long, ragged breath. "I wasn't sure," Chris said, his voice half sob, half mad laugh, "Where I was. When I was. I still see the stones, Nic. It's so dark. So cold."

The glows in the bedroom were still on, the way Santi had left them the night before, when he'd left Chris peacefully asleep there. He could see the light shining beneath the door.

Santi sank down to the floor with his back to the door. His back against Chris's, maybe, with only wood between them. "Open your eyes, love. You're here at home with me. Open your eyes."

For the span of several long, deep breaths, Santi heard only sniffling from the other side of the door. When Chris finally spoke, it was in a barely audible whisper. "I'm afraid."

Bullets to the heart, those words. He was failing Chris, sitting here like this. He might fail him worse on the other side of the door. "I know," he said softly. "I know. There's nothing wrong with being afraid. But I promise, you'll feel better if you open your eyes."

Something brushed Santi's ass. He thought it a figment of his hormone-addled imagination for an instant, until Chris said, "Hold my hand?"

Santi shifted. Looked down. There, shoved through the gap beneath the door, were Chris's fingers. His left hand; Santi knew by the crooked index finger and the cracked nail on the middle finger that had grown in badly. Twining his fingers with Chris's was enough to make his heart beat faster, but he forced himself to control his breathing. His omega needed him, but not in the way his instincts said. He pictured Chris's office empty and covered in dust, the way he'd found it when he returned from his mission to find Chris gone, a symbol of his duty to make things right again for Chris. "I'm here, love. I've got you. Open your eyes."

There was a soft gasp from the other side of the door, then a shaky laugh. "It's real. You're real. I was so afraid that you were..." A sob cut off his words. A few more muffled sobs, and then, "I was out of my mind when I thought I could do this alone, Nic. I need you. Come here, please."

"You know I can't do that right now." God, the feel of his fingers. When had his skin gotten so sensitive that even the press of finger against finger seemed a lewd suggestion? Santi felt himself getting hard again, and the visualizations were only slowing it down, not stopping it entirely. He moved on to the next level of visualizations. Disgust and hatred. Battlefields strewn with corpses. The Artifex Magnus. The images, entirely imagined as Chris never spoke of them, of Christopher's tormentors.

He didn't realize he'd started growling until he heard Chris whimper on the other side of the door. His fingers were curling as if they were claws, and Chris drew his hand back. "I'm sorry," he said, but it came out too harsh. He stood on shaky legs, his cock rising with the rest of him as he thought of Chris on the other side of the door, cowering and frightened.

Vulnerable.

God help him, he was as bad as them, to get hard at the thought of Chris so helpless. He needed to get away before he did the things his instincts were telling him to do. "I'm going to take a shower. Stay there. I'll be back." He wasn't sure he would be, but that seemed a small lie to tell, if it might keep Chris from coming after him.

"Nic, no, please. I need you. Please. Come here. You can have me. All of me."

Santi shut out his lover's pleas. He drew in the deepest breath he could take of Chris's maddening sandalwood and parchment scent, and he marched himself down the hall to the bathroom, where he intended to lock himself in and stand in the shower jerking off until his cock hurt.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wolfe's preferred breakfast dates back to ancient Egypt: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ful_medames  
Santi's pre-heat dinner really is called "spaghetti in the style of prostitutes": https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spaghetti_alla_puttanesca


	6. Alexandria

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Angst, sexual frustration, and finally some comfort sex.

**December, 2030**

Alone, Wolfe faced the abyss. He pounded on the door, crying out for Nic, certain the voice he'd just heard had been another illusion, one come to taunt him in his misery. The door, hard and unyielding wood, gave no answer.

It didn't occur to him that he could open it.

He burned with need. His body had become an aching, gaping void, and that feeling brought with it memories.

He tried to control it, to call up wanted memories to block out the horrors that clawed at him. 

Not memories of heats with Nic. Nic never left him empty for so long. Nic filled him from the time his temperature started to rise until his fluids ran dry. Nic marked his neck with bites and his body with scratches, and afterward, he kissed him and curled around him, and lulled him to sleep with his rumbling purr. He never felt empty when he had Nic, and remembering that fullness now would only make the pain worse.

Nor did he reach for memories of other heats alone. He'd always had his toys, before. He'd left them locked in their box in the spare room this time. Whatever his body said, he wanted to prove to himself that he didn't really need to be filled with anything, even wood or steel.

But there had been once, in Russia. Not that first time. They'd both been on blockers then, and Nic had done the courteous thing and left the room shortly after they'd caught each other's scents. But years later, on what should have been a quick mission to retrieve a cache of books discovered in a bricked-off cellar of an old fortress. Such a routine job that they took along only a half century of troops for security, and that only because of Wolfe's gold band and the need to make an impression on the local nobles who'd uncovered the books. Their contraceptive injections were due at the end of the month, but that had seemed so far away. They would be back by then. They'd been certain of it. He hadn't even packed extra pills.

The ambush had taken them all by surprise. As had the blizzard. Weeks dragged on, and the pills Wolfe had packed ran out. There were no more to be had. By that time, he was past due for his contraceptive dose, but there was none of that to be had, either. But Nic, ever the prepared soldier, had an extra pack of his own pills, so when Wolfe's heat came on, he'd locked them both into a bedroom and taken a double dose. In the warmth of Nic's arms, bundled in furs, Wolfe had rode out the heat.

Those were the memories he called on now. The way Nic stroked his hair and whispered softly to him. The way Nic held him tightly when his body strained for fullness it could not be given.

Stumbling back to the bed, Wolfe wrapped himself in the fur blanket and the memory until he could almost feel Nic's hands on him. With every twitch of his body, the fur rubbed against his sensitized skin, soothing his burning need to be touched, if not his need to be filled. For a while, he lost himself, floating between reality and illusion, present and past.

Nic's voice whispered to him.

Warmth surrounded him.

Gentle hands moved over his body.

Hands.

Whose hands?

He froze, a sharp pain in his chest. His scars burned. He wasn't sure he could breathe. He didn't know where he was. Couldn't bring himself to open his eyes.

There were too many hands. All over his body, petting, grabbing, pulling, striking, penetrating. No matter how he thrashed and growled, he couldn't escape. Part of him didn't want to. The smell of alpha surrounded him. Nic's smell, his nose told him, but that was wrong. These weren't his hands.

The wild, animal part of his mind didn't care. They were alphas. He needed an alpha. He had to stop fighting. They wouldn't hurt him if he didn't fight.

Oh, but they would. He remembered, and old wounds flared into agony. Panic overtook heat, and he curled into a shaking, sobbing ball, protecting his stomach from kicking feet and swinging fists.

Strong, solid hands came to rest on his shoulders.

"Shh, relax, you're safe. I'm not going to hurt you." The voice sounded like Nic's. An illusion. It had to be an illusion. His phantom, come to comfort him.

The hands on his shoulders remained still, but he felt Nic's hands on his side and his back, too, petting him slowly, softly.

Gods, how he wished he could believe in any of it. But, no, he understood now. It wasn't the guards. It was Qualls, and he was going ever madder, because the dream of Nic he'd summoned to comfort himself remained right alongside the torturer. Those were Nic's hands, just as he remembered them. But when he focused, when he thought about it, one set of those hands could only be Qualls. Nothing else made sense.

"No, please, leave me alone," he begged, his voice barely a whisper.

The smell of cedar filled his nose. Incense, only incense, he told himself, but it smelled too real. Thick and musky with rut.

"Who is it, Chris? Who is hurting you?" Nic's voice? It sounded like Nic's voice. A strange question. Could he not see Qualls, right there on Wolfe's other side? Strange, the logic of his tortured dreams.

Wolfe couldn't answer, couldn't bring himself to speak, but he lifted a shaky hand, still tangled in the blanket, to point toward the place where Qualls had to be.

"You are safe now. I won't let anyone hurt you." Nic's voice deepened to a growl, "No one hurts my omega. No one."

The weight of Nic's hands shifted, gone for an instant, and then replaced by the weight of Nic's body, crouched over him, covering him, shielding him. There were no hands touching him at all now, only Nic's body wrapped around his, arms and legs to either side, blocking out any other sensation.

The smell of cedar thickened in the air, and Nic let out a roar. "Go away. Leave him alone. You don't get to hurt him anymore."

Qualls was gone, vanished like the nightmare he'd been, and only Nic remained. Wolfe let out a shuddering breath, half a sob.

Nuzzling his forehead, Nic said, "You're safe, love. I am here. Open your eyes for me." His voice was still deep, rumbling. Soothing.

It was the sound of his alpha, there at last to take care of him, and Wolfe was all too glad to open his eyes and see Nic's face. The sight of Nic, aglow with a halo of late afternoon light, dressed in full uniform, plunged Wolfe back into reality with the shock of falling into icy water.

There was no space at all between their bodies. Only the blanket and Nic's clothes stood between them and the union Wolfe was determined to avoid. Fragile barriers, all too easily torn away.

"With me now?" Nic asked, his gaze far too intense.

Wolfe nodded, not trusting himself to speak. The emptiness ached within, and Nic was so very close. That was wrong. He didn't want that. Part of him didn't want that. Why? It was so hard to remember through the haze of need.

"Good." Nic pushed himself upright and swung a leg over to sit beside Wolfe on the bed, and Wolfe whined at the loss of him. Resting a hand lightly on Wolfe's shoulder, Nic said, "I'm sorry it took me so long. I should have been here sooner. You shouldn't have had to stay lost in the past for so long."

Had it been that long? Wolfe shook his head, unable to think. "You're here now." His voice sounded so shaky, even to his own ears.

Nic sighed, clenching the hand in his lap into a fist. "I shouldn't be. This is too much of a risk. I'll go," he said, but he made no motion to stand. His trousers bulged between his legs.

Go? Why would Nic go? A tiny, distant part of him assured him that he wanted Nic to go, but the heat and the panic both cried out in terror at the thought of losing Nic. No, Nic couldn't go. Wolfe needed him. He didn't want to be alone. He didn't want to be empty.

"Stay," he whined, struggling against the blanket tangled around him. "Please." He got his arms loose, and that was enough to get himself onto his hands and knees. If he could just get the blanket the rest of the way off, show Nic how wet and ready he was...

The sudden pressure of Nic's hand on his lower back stopped him, pushing him back down onto the bed. "We are not doing that," Nic said, voice as firm as his hand.

Confused, Wolfe pushed back against his partner's hand, following the demands of his body to present. "Please. _Please_."

A second hand on the back of his neck pinned Wolfe down to the bed. "No," Nic growled. "No. You aren't in your right mind. Neither am I. Be still now."

The combination of Nic's voice and that hand on the back of his neck soothed him on a primal level. His alpha held him. His alpha was in control. He was safe. He would be taken care of. Wolfe let his body relax, arms limp at his sides. But tendrils of fear and memory still curled around him, threatening him to drag him back into panic. He'd heard Nic say he would go. He didn't want Nic to go. "I don't want to be alone," he whined, the small rational part of his mind cringing at the pathetic sound of it.

Still holding Wolfe pinned to the bed, Nic bent to nip the back of his neck. Only the quickest touch of his teeth, and he sat up again. "I'll stay. But you have to control yourself. If you can hold still, I'll rub your back." He curled the fingers on the hand on Wolfe's back in promise.

That sounded good. Not only to his instincts and his fears, but to the higher mind that was slowly regaining control as Nic calmed the primal screaming within him. Nic's touch would keep those wild and fearful parts of him quiet. Yes, he could control himself, for that. He could ignore the need. "I can," he said, his voice only wobbling slightly.

Nic released his hold, and Wolfe lay perfectly still while his partner pulled the fur blanket up around his shoulders. A barrier. A necessary one, given how close he had just come to losing himself. Once the blanket was securely tucked around him, Nic's hands moved over Wolfe's back in broad, firm strokes, a feeling that drew a purr from him, soft and wavering at first, but gaining in strength. Dimly, he understood what this had to be costing Nic, and the understanding of it brought tears to his eyes.

"Thank you." The words came out burbling, near incoherent. "Oh, Nic. Nic." He'd wanted to say more, but the words wouldn't come to his tongue.

"Shh. Rest. I am here." Nic purred, his hands continuing their rhythmic motion.

Wolfe let the sound of that purr and the smell of smoky cedar carry him away from his tangled thoughts.

* * *

Three times through the night, Christopher's heat peaked, his sandalwood and parchment scent growing unbearably thick while his body squirmed and struggled against Santi's hands, and Santi's cock grew painfully hard, his sanity fraying. His omega lay right there in front of him, begging for him, and his alpha instincts raged at the injustice of that. Why should they both continue to suffer from need of each other, when he had only to tear that blanket away and thrust himself into Chris's waiting hole? Chris _wanted_ him. Every signal from his body announced that desire. His scent, his whimpers and moans, the upward thrusts of his hips...

Santi had to look away, often, going through his visualization exercises until he could forget the sight of Chris offering himself. He rubbed chili-infused oil under his nose to drown out the smell, a last resort he'd learned in training. It made his skin burn, but it helped. When the desire grew especially bad, he thrust his hand into his pants to wrap tightly around his cock, reminding himself that he'd already jerked it raw in the shower. Even a light touch was painful, but he squeezed until he softened, somewhat. Never completely. Not with the scent of omega in heat so heavy around him that even chili oil couldn't hold it back entirely.

Christopher's hot, slick depths would cure the pain he'd inflicted on himself, Santi's instincts whispered. His cock would feel better as soon as it was inside Chris, when his knot formed and he closed his teeth on Chris's neck. Everything would be better then.

But it wouldn't. He retained just enough of his mind to know that it wouldn't.

While Chris was awake, he devoted all his attention to soothing him, easing his own yearning by telling the wild part of himself he was preparing his omega for mating. The need for a calm and ready mate was something even that mindless beast could understand. He hated himself for even that small concession. It meant that part of him was no better than the monsters who'd abused Chris. Part of him could see an omega in distress and think only of satisfying his own greedy cock. Not even any omega, but his beloved, the one he should want to protect more than anything else.

The sane part of his mind was stronger, though. It reminded him, time and again, of Chris's much greater pain. When none of his practiced visualizations worked, the image of Chris bleeding on the bed brought him back to himself. That last stronghold of sanity let him get up, every time Chris dozed off, to put on another pot of coffee to keep himself awake. He couldn't let himself sleep. He would be too vulnerable to the predator within. By the time the sun came up, he was jittery and twitching.

Hours more went by before the scent of sandalwood at last started to wane enough that Santi couldn't smell it past the chili oil. Chris's breathing deepened as he sank from the lighter slumber of heat into deeper dreams. Exhausted, Santi stumbled to the bathroom to drag one last painful orgasm out of himself, watching in relief as his cock softened afterward. His rut was passing with Chris's heat, their systems synchronized even after they'd spent the past days fighting their bodies.

Santi returned to the bed, just in case Chris missed him, and collapsed on top of the covers, his head not even finding a pillow before he lost consciousness.

He woke to the waning light of sunset through the window and Chris smiling down at him, dabbing ointment on the irritated skin under his nose. Chris looked well, his hair brushed, his skin free of sweat, his favorite red robe tied neatly, and his eyes alert and clear, shining with affection. On the nightstand, Santi spotted an empty mug and a Blank, signs that Chris had been up for a while, waiting for him.

"I'm sorry, my love, for asking so much of you," Chris said, placing a soft kiss on the tip of Santi's nose.

Taking a deep breath, Santi could pick up his partner's sandalwood and parchment scent, but with his rut past, it inspired more adoration than wild lust. He wrapped an arm around Chris's waist and pulled him in for a lingering kiss. "You cannot ask too much of me," he said when their lips parted.

Chris rested his forehead, back to normal temperature, against Santi's. "Don't tempt me with such grand promises. This was enough. Truly. It means more than I can possibly explain that you did this for me, that even when I was weak and unreasonable, you..." His voice wavered, and he turned away to dab his eyes on the sleeve of his robe. "You are a better alpha than I could ever deserve, my dear Nic."

Santi sat up and pulled his lover into his arms. "I gave you basic respect and care. Nothing more. Don't imply that you deserve anything less."

"But I didn't make that easy for you, did I?" Chris cut off any answer Santi might have given with another kiss, this one with more hunger and passion to it. "And now, love, I think it's high time I took care of you." His hand crept up Santi's thigh until it brushed his cock.

That light, teasing brush might as well have been the claws of an automaton. Santi cringed back from it, a nervous laugh bubbling up from him. "Not there. Please. I might, ah, might have been overly vigorous in keeping my body in check last night."

"Hmm." Chris pushed him back down onto the bed. "I'd intended to give you the thing I denied you during my heat. But there are other possibilities, if you're so inclined," he said, his hand slipping around, skirting past Santi's sensitized cock to squeeze his ass through his trousers. "It's been entirely too long since I was inside you, don't you think?"

Santi's breath caught in his throat. They hadn't done anything of the sort since before Chris's disappearance. It seemed too risky a thing to even want, let alone speak of, considering the hell Chris had been through. Chris had seemed content with the pleasures hands and mouths could offer on the rare occasions he showed arousal, and Santi had been willing to accept that. Just one more sacrifice at the altar of Christopher's recovery. To hear Chris offer it again, and so boldly, made Santi's cock swell painfully in his pants.

It also struck fear into his heart. If he took more than Chris could safely give, it might set back all the progress they had made. Watching his partner's face closely, he asked, "Is that something you want?"

In answer, Chris untied the robe and let it drop, revealing his erection. He'd showered, Santi noticed. Washed the mess of omega fluids from himself and cleaned up the scars he'd scratched open in his fit of panic. "I want it very much," Chris said, grinning as he reached for Santi's belt. "Do you?"

"Please." Santi's hands itched to reach down and help Chris get him out of his clothes. He dug them into the sheets, making himself wait while Chris stripped him, not quite slow enough to be teasing, but deliberate. As if every piece of clothing he removed was a separate choice that he made. Chris had been denied so many choices in that terrible year. It meant the world to Santi to be sure that this choice, at least, was his.

The clothing out of the way, Chris slipped two oiled fingers into Santi, gently stretching him until a third fit in. There was an intense look of focus in his eyes as he worked, the same look he had when he worked on a project of great importance to him. A look that made Santi's stomach feel warm and fluttery, as if they were young again, discovering each other for the first time. A few slow thrusts of those three fingers, and Chris leaned over Santi to kiss him, pressing their naked bodies together. "Ready?" he whispered with a hint of a purr.

Mimicking Chris's slow and deliberate movements, Santi loosened his fingers from the sheets and embraced his partner. "Yes. Fuck me, Chris, please." He let one hand climb up Chris's back to run his fingers through his hair.

Chris positioned himself at Santi's entrance, cutting off any further begging with a kiss. Slow and deliberate, he pressed inward, every inch a choice. One that he made gladly, to judge by the tenderness and affection of his lips on Santi's. When he'd buried himself to the hilt, he let out a sigh, collapsing against Santi. Tears overflowed from his eyes, and he shivered, even as a purr rumbled in his chest.

Santi shifted his hands to Chris's shoulders. "Christopher, love, are you all right?" he asked, giving a reassuring purr.

"Yes..." Chris said. Sniffled. Pushed up on his arms and looked at Santi with a wistful smile and adoration in his watery eyes. "Yes. I am. Gods, Nic, I missed this. I missed this so much."

"So did I, _amore mio_," Santi said. He let his hands slide back around to embrace his partner. "So did I."

With that same slow deliberation, Chris rocked his hips, creating a gentle rhythm that struck Santi's prostate with every thrust while he leaned in to cover Santi's face and neck with kisses. Tears continued to trickle down Chris's cheeks, but there was such warmth in his purring that Santi could not doubt that he was enjoying himself. Slowly, steadily, the pleasure built, layer upon layer. Sandalwood and cedar mingled as their scents rose with their arousal. After a while, Chris picked up his pace, making Santi's breathing quicken and his arms tighten around Chris, his climax drawing near.

Hovering at the edge, not wanting to take Chris by surprise, he gasped, "I'm close. So close."

Chris smiled down at him. "Go on, my love. Let go. You don't have to control yourself now."

Santi released the tension of holding himself back, and the climax washed over him. A soft, gentle climax, not one that swept him away, but one that filled him to bursting with love and warmth and cleansed him of the wild need that had gnawed at his sanity. Only a few drops of ejaculate dripped onto his stomach, his balls not yet recovered from being so thoroughly emptied the night before. Chris continued his thrusting through the whole of it, and when it was done, he stretched out his neck in offering.

"A bite, love, please," he panted. "Mark me. Make me yours."

Gently at first, and then harder when Chris let out a needy whine, Santi bit the spot where neck met shoulder, the place where instinct would have driven him to leave his mark on Chris, had they coupled in heat and rut. A place he chose now to reaffirm that bond, to assure Chris that whether they indulged those instinctive desires or not, they would always belong to one another. With a cry of relief, Chris finished, collapsing onto Santi's chest and clinging to him while he shivered with the spasms of orgasm.

Murmuring words of adoration, Santi combed his fingers through Chris's hair, nuzzling and kissing the mark he'd made on his lover's neck while Chris grew soft within him. Mingled sandalwood and cedar, smoke and parchment, swirled around them, and for the first time in over a year, Santi felt truly complete. Chris was his, and he was Chris's, and together, they were healing.


	7. Alexandria

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hurt/comfort with lots of sexual tension. No torture details, but a few vague references to Rome, some thoughts of self harm, and plenty of trauma.

**March, 2031**

"You smell good today."

Leaving his Blank open on the bed, Wolfe rolled lazily over to nuzzle his lover's bare chest. Rubbing his cheek against soft hair and firm muscle, he breathed in their mingled scents and sighed with contentment. "As do you, my dear."

With an appreciative purr, Nic ran his fingers through Wolfe's hair, and Wolfe leaned his head back into the touch, his book forgotten.

It was going on evening, and they'd barely left the bed all day. It was one of those lazy days that all too recently Wolfe had been certain he'd lost forever, and he treasured the peace now more than ever before. There was such simple yet deep pleasure in lying side by side, letting their whims dictate whether they read or talked, curled together or stretched out separately. They'd even eaten in bed, leaving breadcrumbs and coffee drips and smears of jam all over the sheets, which Wolfe knew would irritate him later, but for now, he couldn't bring himself to care. Indeed, as his hands roamed over his partner's strong back, Wolfe considered that he might like to make more of a mess of the sheets, in an entirely different fashion.

Nic kissed Wolfe's forehead, then his neck, inhaling audibly. His lips traveled back up to Wolfe's forehead, where they lingered. "You're a little warm." He sniffed again.

Wolfe's heart skipped a beat. After months of anxious waiting and pregnancy tests inspired by nightmares and paranoia, he should have been relieved. Excited, even. But it was apprehension he felt as he asked, "Are you sure? You aren't imagining it?"

Rolling away, Nic fished in the nightstand drawer for a thermometer. When he rolled back with it in hand, Wolfe opened his mouth and accepted it without comment. Together, they watched the mercury rise.

Now that he thought about it, Nic's scent seemed stronger.

The sheets felt softer, the crumbs sharper.

He'd eaten a lot today. The jam had been so sweet, the croissants so buttery.

And was this spark of desire merely the inevitable result of spending the day in bed with his lovely soldier, he wearing only a nightshirt, and Nic entirely nude? Or was it...?

The mercury stopped, a fraction of a degree above normal.

Wolfe passed the thermometer back to his partner. "Some degree of variance is entirely normal," he pointed out.

Nic sniffed the air again as he returned the thermometer to its place. "And so is variance in scent, but together?"

"The odds of the two occurring simultaneously are lower, that is true," he had to concede. "But there's nothing else." Well, there was arousal, but that was mild and entirely reasonable after spending a day in bed with Niccolo Santi. Not the wild and mindless need of heat.

(He didn't want to think about how mindless. He was past that now. He wanted to be past that now.)

"Could just be starting." Propped up on one elbow, Nic regarded Wolfe with a look of concern. "Shouldn't be too late for pills, if you'd rather avoid it." His voice was so carefully neutral that if he didn't know better, Wolfe might have thought it made no difference to Nic.

Wolfe, of course, knew better. He knew perfectly well how hard his last heat had been on Nic, and how much Nic missed the connection they shared during heats together. He knew that Nic's body, like his own, yearned to follow the urges of hormones and instincts. And even if Nic truly didn't care one way or another, Wolfe was tired of the fears that had kept him from sharing a heat with Nic for this long. It was long past time he put those fears to rest. "I don't want to avoid it," he said. "Just don't get your hopes up. It could be nothing."

"I know." Nic leaned in for a kiss, and Wolfe rose to meet him, pushing him over onto his back.

Kicking away the sheet that had been draped over the lower half of his partner's body, Wolfe was not surprised to see Nic's cock already hardening. He swung a leg over and climbed on top of his lover, kissing him all the while. Hip rolled against hip, and together, they hardened, the heavy aromas of cedar and sandalwood rising around them. They made love, cock to cock, and Wolfe told himself he had chosen that position on mere whim. He kept his lips pressed to Nic's, and he told himself it was passion. And when his climax was slow to come, he blamed it on age.

But as he lay atop Nic, panting in the aftermath of it, he knew he lied to himself. Already, his body whispered its desire to be filled, its yearning to be bitten, and though he had proven he could find pleasure by other means, he knew that his body would not remain convinced. It might be nothing, he had said, but in truth he knew it wasn't. He knew what was coming, and knowing made the waiting so much worse.

* * *

Christopher might not be ready to acknowledge his oncoming heat, but his scent told a different story. The sandalwood and parchment aroma of his pheromones was already strong enough that Santi could smell it from the kitchen when their growling stomachs drove him from the bed to prepare dinner. He resisted the urge to make _puttanesca; _it would only irritate Chris, and there were steaks in need of cooking. He did prepare extra food, though, and he was not at all surprised when between the two of them, they finished it all, down to the last of the baklava. Both their bodies craved nutrition in preparation for the exertion to come.

That appetite would be gone come morning, at the rate this rut seemed to be coming on, replaced by a different sort of appetite. Santi could feel it, inevitable as the spinning of the earth, and were it not for his worry about his omega, he would have welcomed it with open arms. He liked the energy of rut, the sensitivity of his skin. He missed feeling both their minds and bodies working in perfect union during the wild frenzy of coupling. There was no room for anything but each other at the peak, and he longed to lose himself in Christopher again. But only if it brought his beloved the same joy.

While Chris cleaned up the kitchen, Santi intended to return to his reading, but instead he found himself going through the closet that held their nesting supplies and taking inventory. He ran his fingers over the dark red silk of the sheets and the soft fur of Chris's new blanket. By some mystery of cleansing known only to the laundry service they employed, the fur was unstained and smelled only mildly of sandalwood. All of the pillows sat neatly on their shelves, waiting for him to squeeze them and inspect their coverings, which he did with meticulous care. There were the big silk-covered ones to facilitate comfortable positioning and an array of smaller ones covered in silk and velvet, leather and fur to satisfy their heightened senses of touch. Santi particularly liked the suede ones. Just the right mixture of softness and strength. He could already picture where he would put them when he arranged the bed. 

From a higher shelf, the shimmer of more silk caught his eye. The bed canopy. They rarely used it; the near-translucently thin red silk tore easily and was something of a challenge to hang properly. But it was traditional, dating back to ancient times, and this was a time for tradition, Santi thought. Chris had a deep appreciation for the practices of the past. Immersing him in history would put him at ease.

He was considering the question of lighting - candles were traditional, but flames could make Chris nervous - when the smell of sandalwood intensified and Chris embraced him from behind. "Unusual for you to get broody before me," Chris murmured, probably as close of an admission as he would give to being in the early stages of heat.

Returning the Venetian glass oil lamp he'd been considering to its place on the shelf, Santi turned to take his lover in his arms. Chris nuzzled Santi's chest as Santi held him close, an instinctive little omega gesture that announced his coming heat as well as his scent. Santi gave him a gentle bite on the neck in return, and Chris purred, rubbing his cheek against Santi. "I'm going to take good care of you, if you'll let me," Santi said with an answering purr.

For long enough that Santi began to worry his partner might have fallen into memories or paranoia, Chris said nothing. He kept purring, which would have been more reassuring if Santi had not heard his partner purr to soothe himself in the depth of delusions. Chris imagined Santi in those moments, he had confessed once, imagined him vividly enough to purr at the comfort the fantasy offered. Santi's own imagination was not nearly so strong, but still he could picture it clearly enough: Christopher chained in the dark, purring as he nuzzled the cold stone beneath him. The image twisted Santi's guts into knots, and he felt his arms tightening around his beloved, as if holding him tighter now could make up for that abandonment.

It couldn't. Nothing could; not even Christopher's repeated assurances that he didn't blame Santi had been enough to relieve that guilt. All he could do was loosen his arms before he hurt or frightened his partner, and stroke the long and silky waves of his dark hair, and hope this silence wasn't the bad kind.

After a while, Chris said, softly, "Yes. I think I'd like that."

Letting out a sigh of relief, Santi kissed the top of his beloved omega's head, letting the scent of his hair wash over him. "I'll make sure of it," he said, and kissed Chris again.

* * *

Wolfe fell asleep in the security of Nic's arms with his heat still a distant threat on the horizon. A problem for the next day, or perhaps even the day after, if it built slowly. He woke dripping with sweat, his heart pounding, convinced that he'd just felt a small foot kick his ribs from within. He pulled the sheets tighter around himself and tried to reason himself back to sleep.

These dreams were utterly irrational. He couldn't be pregnant. He and Nic had both received their monthly contraceptive doses just a week ago, and Nic always used a condom for penetration now, just in case. He'd had a pregnancy test just before the contraceptive shot, and it had been negative. Even the sensation itself was the work of pure imagination. None of his pregnancies had progressed to the point of quickening. His pregnancies. Gods, the thought of it still sickened him, even after so long. The things that would have happened to his body...

Shuddering and nauseous, he rolled over and reached for Nic, only to find empty space. _Morning already?_ It seemed dark, or at least what passed for dark in their bedroom now. Eight months of freedom, and still he couldn't sleep well without a small glow on. He opened his eyes, rubbed them, blinked until the blur of the clock face resolved into visible hands and lines that somewhat resembled numbers. Just past five o'clock, an hour soldiers defined as morning but sensible people did not. Apparently, Wolfe would not be counting himself among the sensible today. He closed his eyes in one last futile attempt at sleep, but it was no use. At the very least, he was going to have to use the bathroom before he could sleep again. His body was insistent on that point, which only aggravated the insistent whisper in the back of his mind that he was pregnant.

Nothing to do but drag himself out of bed.

The glows were already on in the bathroom, and the air around the door was thick with the smell of cedar. Wolfe felt warmer just breathing it in, almost too warm. The door was ajar, so Wolfe pushed it open, expecting to find Nic at the sink for his morning shave. But the space before the sink was empty, the counter cleared and the mirror so clean it sparkled. They always kept the house clean - between Nic's military habits and Wolfe's fastidious tendencies, neither could stand to let things go too long without scrubbing - but Wolfe was prone to leaving his hairbrush out, and Nic usually kept his shaving supplies on the counter. This level of tidiness spoke of nesting urges. No question now that Nic had been the one to begin this cycle of heat and rut; he was clearly further along.

Nic knelt beside the bathtub, scrubbing. He wore an Egyptian _shendyt_ made of white silk trimmed with gold thread, and his upper body was bare except for a wide, collar-like necklace of sparkling stones and gold beads, the larger ones inscribed with hieroglyphs. Truly bare, not only of clothing, but also of hair. He'd waxed and oiled his skin, making every ridge of muscle shimmer as he moved. 

Wolfe had woken from a nightmare and stepped into a fantasy, and the effect was dizzying. He braced himself against the door frame, momentarily overwhelmed by the confusion of nausea and desire, fear and affection, that warred within him, along with the more irksome need that had brought him to the bathroom in the first place.

As Wolfe stepped into the room, Nic turned and bowed to him, so low that his forehead touched the floor, but not before Wolfe caught sight of the erection tenting the fabric of the _shendyt _and the kohl around his lover's eyes_. _"At your service, my love," Nic said.

That should have given arousal the upper hand, but nausea swelled, and Wolfe stumbled, grasping the counter for support. Nic was at his side in a heartbeat, murmuring reassurances as he helped Wolfe to the toilet. His scent shifted, taking on a fresher, woodier note as it did when Nic was feeling protective.

"Sorry," Wolfe muttered once he'd taken care of the necessary business and exited the bathroom to find Nic waiting in the hall, fresh pajamas draped over his arm. "You're going to all this trouble, and I..." He let out a frustrated sigh and gestured to his body, shaking despite the heat in his blood, flushed and sweaty but still dry in the places that needed to be wet to satisfy Nic.

"Shh. It's too early for you still. It's all right," Nic said, offering Wolfe the pajamas. "I can wait. There are a few more things I want to prepare, anyway. Let's get you out of those sweaty things and back to bed." 

He leaned on Nic while he changed, shivering when the removal of his sweaty clothing exposed hot skin to the air. The shaking only intensified when he got into the clean clothes, the the fabric amazingly soft against his skin. He hated this part of the heat cycle, when the hormone levels built enough to make him uncomfortable but not enough to do anything for relief. It usually didn't last long, at least. If he could get back to sleep, he might wake ready for Nic.

Back in the bedroom, he let Nic pull the covers up around his shoulders, the brush of his partner's fingers pleasant, soothing, not yet a tease. "Rest, love," Nic said, sitting on the edge of the bed. He tucked a sweat-damp strand of hair back behind Wolfe's ear. "Sleep. I will be here to take care of you." The fabric of Nic's _shendyt_ lay flat between his legs now, Wolfe noticed. So he was not yet so far into rut that he could not control his arousal.

It had to be difficult, though, and it should not have been necessary. His beautiful alpha, waxed and oiled and adorned for his pleasure, attended to him. The aroma of smoky cedar filled his nose. Even if his body was not yet lubricating itself, Wolfe should have been able to do more than shake and make a pathetic grab for his partner's hand, mumbling half-coherently. "Oh, Nic... I thought I could... I don't know if I can..." He gave his head a vicious shake to clear it, turning his face into the pillow. "You deserve so much better than this."

Nic caught Wolfe's trembling hand and brought it to his lips for a soft kiss. His other hand moved through Wolfe's hair and down his back in firm strokes. "Shh. None of that. There's no shame in being afraid."

"I'm not -" Denial came easily to his lips, but Nic cut him off with the light touch of finger to mouth. Irrationally bereft at the loss of Nic's hand from his back, Wolfe let out a whimper, only to cringe at the pathetic sound of it.

"Don't lie." The words might have been harsh, had Nic not switched to Italian and spoken so softly. "You've earned your fear, beloved. Much as I wish I could take it from you, I would not have you deny it. I want to know what you're feeling. I need to, if I'm going to take good care of you." He cupped Wolfe's cheek as he spoke, gently keeping him from looking away. "Can you be honest for me, Chris?"

Looking into his lover's kohl-lined eyes, Wolfe could only answer, "Yes." His voice came out all breathy, and he found himself rolling onto his back, exposing his belly in instinctive submission. He felt a brief flash of unease, an urge to roll onto his side and curl into a ball to protect himself, but it passed as he looked up at Nic. His alpha, so beautiful in traditional clothing that promised adherence to the old rituals Wolfe so loved. His lover, who had cared for him through madness and pain.

"Good." Lifting his hand, Nic followed the line of Wolfe's jaw down to his neck, and from there to his chest. There, he found the contours of a scar through the thin fabric of Wolfe's shirt, tracing it with the familiarity of long practice. So many times he'd stroked those scars, tending them while they were still open and sore, driving back itching and phantom pain, reassuring Wolfe that he loved every broken piece. "I want you to be comfortable," he said as his fingers moved from one scar to the next. "Shall I tell you the things I will do to keep you safe?"

Wolfe nodded, not trusting himself to speak. He willed his mind into silence, focusing on the sound of Nic's voice and the soft pleasure of Nic's petting. This was right, his instincts said, this was as it should be. His alpha would guide him deeper into his heat and satisfy his needs. His alpha would take care of him. Suddenly heavy, his hand slipped from Nic's, landing on the mattress, and Nic stroked Wolfe's face with the hand he'd released. Light brushes of fingertips over cheeks, forehead, eyebrows, silently urging him to close his eyes. His whole body felt heavy, too heavy to move, too heavy even to tremble. And so warm, as if Nic were the sun shining down on him, suffusing him with warmth.

Nic's voice seemed to wrap around him, flowing with the tendrils of his scent to speak to mind and instinct alike. Listening to his lover's litany of locked doors and condoms, safe nests and rut control training, he let his body yield to Nic's touch, relaxing until his eyes fell shut, carrying the vision of Nic's smooth-waxed body with him into dreams.

* * *

There was just enough time while Chris slept peacefully to finish the cleaning and get the nesting supplies organized. Santi had just moved the side table in from the living room to hold bedside necessities when Chris cried out in his sleep. A long, wavering wail. More fear than pain, Santi thought. Tangled in the sheets, Chris curled into a tight ball, the parchment notes of his scent turning musty. He always protected his stomach. The worst of the abuses he'd endured, the ones that left visible marks, at least, had been inflicted on that delicate flesh. At least some of the invisible ones as well. Santi saw the way his lover's hands would sometimes probe his stomach as if feeling something that wasn't there. Something beneath the surface. He remembered seeing the bruises staining his partner's skin on the night of his release. The blood on the bed.

The room smelled like a war zone, thick with the smoke of his anger and the rot of Christopher's fear. He couldn't let Chris wake to that. Willing his clenched fists to relax, he redirected his thoughts. Chris had been hurt, yes, but he would protect Chris from being hurt again. He would keep his beloved safe. Far as he was into his rut, it was easy enough to channel those protective urges. Harder to keep them from turning to other urges. It helped that the nest wasn't properly arranged yet; he could convince the beast that his omega wouldn't be safe without the canopy hung and the sheets changed.

When the air around him smelled more like a damp forest than a battlefield, Santi sat down next to his whimpering partner and put a hand on his trembling shoulder. Chris's skin burned. His heat was progressing faster now, coming into line with Santi's rut as they breathed in each other's pheromones. They would peak together, and soon.

Time to wake Chris. Coming out of a nightmare and into the peak of heat would be terrible for him. Very gently, but with increasing pressure, Santi stroked his partner's arm. "Christopher, my love, wake up," he murmured in Italian.

Letting out a cry that sent chills down Santi's spine, Chris jerked away. He curled up so tightly that his tremors intensified with the effort of it, and his shoulders shook even harder with the force of harsh, gasping breaths. This was one of the stronger nightmares, then. One that crossed the line into reality to distort Chris's perception of the waking world. Santi might have left him alone if not for the progression of his heat. Sometimes, painful as it was to hear his lover's cries, it was best to let the nightmares work themselves out.

But not this time. Lying in the bed beside his partner, Santi pulled Chris into a tight embrace. He rubbed his cheek against Christopher's, raising and mingling their scents, and though he felt more like crying, he purred to his beloved. "I am here, Christopher. It's me. It's Nic. You are safe. Come back to me."

Chris struggled at first, as he always did, crying pitifully while his body thrashed. It never hurt any less to do this to him. If anything, it was worse with him in heat and the smell of his distress so strong. Like moldy books, forgotten in some damp cellar.

Abandoned in the dark. No, he couldn't let his thoughts go there. Santi made himself notice instead how much stronger Chris was now than he had been on the night of his release. He was still too thin, but the muscle was coming back to his limbs. He put up more of a fight than he had the first time Santi had, for lack of better ideas, held his flailing love while he fought his way free of a nightmare.

Soon enough - the clock, at least, said it had not been so long - the fight went out of Chris. A moment of exhaustion, boneless and breathless, followed by wriggling more inquisitive than aggressive, moving himself closer, squirming downward to rub his cheek against Santi's chest. His head stilled for the space of a few breaths, ragged but deep, as he listened to Santi's heartbeat. Just long enough for Santi to feel his partner's erection against his thigh.

Ah, there it was, the sandalwood smell of arousal, growing stronger as the moldering parchment of fear declined.

Chris raised his head, eyes still unfocused, nose twitching as he sniffed the air. His tongue poked out of his mouth, hesitant, and licked Santi's chest. He purred and gave another, more enthusiastic lick.

"You like that, do you?" Santi said, trailing a hand down his lover's back while Chris continued to explore with his tongue. The feeling of wet tongue on skin already sensitive with rut and sensitized even further by hair removal was enough to make him shiver, his cock jumping to attention.

Hope of beginning the rut then and there lasted only until Santi got a finger between Christopher's cheeks. Only barely moist there, and tightly clenched. Whining with what sounded like a mixture of fear and need, Chris pressed his hips back against Santi's hand.

Still shaken enough by the nightmare that speech failed him, then, but already driven by the demands of his heat. Exactly what Santi had feared. He'd been wrong to encourage Chris to rest more, it seemed.

Too late now for regret. Giving a reassuring purr and nibbling at Chris's neck, Santi shifted to get a hand around his omega's cock. If Chris wasn't ready for penetration, he might still be able to come from other sorts of attention. A good orgasm would relieve the need, drive back the fear, help him relax.

Chris seemed to disagree. Even as Santi began a brisk jerking of his cock, he thrust his hips back against the hand on his ass, whining. One hand seized Santi's cock to give it a meaningful pull.

"There now," Santi said, pausing for a bite to Chris's neck. Not hard enough to be painful, but assertive. "Can't do that yet. You just relax, let me take care of you, then we'll get you a nice bath before you peak, how's that sound?"

A little purr, a nuzzle at his chest, an inquisitive tug at his cock.

"Yes, love, you can play with that if you like. I'm all yours." Continuing to stroke his omega's cock, Santi pressed two fingers against his tightly clenched sphincter to rub him in a gentle circle. Just enough satisfy his growing need for stimulation there, Santi hoped.

And then Chris got both hands on Santi's cock, and further strategic thought proved impossible. Like the tongue still gliding over Santi's chest, it was more playful exploration than anything, but it was enough. Sensation overpowered reason, and he could concentrate on nothing more than the work of his hands and the feeling building in his groin. Chris writhed in his hands. Purred. Moaned. Whimpered. Meaningless sounds, but instinct told Santi what his omega wanted from him. Stroke the omega. Rub his hole. Loosen him up. Ease him open. Fill him.

Focused as he was, Santi didn't notice at first when his lover's sounds shifted from pleasure and need to frustration. He did notice when Chris stopped touching his cock and pushed his hands away.

"Nic," Chris groaned, pushing himself upright. "Enough. It's no use."

It took Santi a moment to wrestle his animal thoughts and the pulse pounding in his cock into submission. "I'm sorry. I thought you'd be able to-"

"Well, I can't," Chris snarled, cutting him off. He stood and headed for the door, muttering, "Might as well go clean up."

* * *

Irritable, Wolfe shoved aside Nic's carefully arranged tray of bath supplies and turned on the shower. His skin prickled with heat, his nether regions burned with unmet need, and he was disgustingly hairy. He could do something about that last one, at least. When the shower reached a pleasantly scorching temperature, he lathered himself and set to work with a razor, taking unusual satisfaction in the task. Alexandrian custom had long favored hair removal, but Wolfe wasn't one to concern himself overmuch with being fashionable, and he certainly didn't believe any of the nonsense about hairless bodies being any cleaner. He'd always shaved when he pleased, no more and no less. Something nagged at the edge of his awareness, though, and shaving somehow scratched that itch. Not so very different from the urge he often felt to pick at scars.

There was some effort in guiding the blade over his scarred skin without cutting himself. He thanked the gods that, like most omegas, he'd never grown hair on his back, or even much of it on his stomach, though removing what little was there proved especially challenging amidst that mess of scars.

_Razors can cut more than hair._

He silenced that unwelcome thought. No, he was not going to give himself to Nic a bloody mess, not when Nic was going to such effort to make this heat a good one for Wolfe. Everything had been arranged so nicely in the bathroom to enable him to follow the same ancient mating ritual they had followed for their first heat together and many times since. Shaving was part of that ritual, part of the thorough cleansing intended to prepare him for joining with his alpha.

That first time, so long ago now, he had found this part relaxing. He'd been so nervous about that first shared heat. Afraid it would hurt, afraid he wouldn't satisfy Nic, afraid that under the influence of hormones, they would find only lust and not love. It eased his nerves to shave, to wash his hair, and to soak in the tub...

Ah, yes, there it was. His feelings about baths were so much more complicated now than they had been back then, weren't they? Showers, too, but those were easier to manage. As long as he kept the shower warm enough, he didn't remembered the shock of cold water. But the baths in the prison had been warm.

They'd brought him to the room with the bath during his heats. They hadn't let him shave. They would never have let him have a razor.

_Razors can cut more than hair._

Not a good direction to let his thoughts wander in. He redirected them to the ritual of grooming, letting the comfortable weight of history settle around him like a heavy blanket. Alexandrian omegas had prepared themselves for heat in this way for thousands of years. He could see himself in that pattern, find the meaning in every step. True, it was a rather silly notion to cleanse oneself with scent glands pouring out their pheromones, but Alexandrians always had valued cleanliness, and there was some logic behind the custom. It marked the boundary between daily life and activity of deeper significance, just as the preparation of the nest established a sacred space. The alpha's cleansing fell into the larger ritual of demonstrative preparation to care for the omega, and the omega's promoted relaxation and...

Wolfe shivered, a strange feeling washing over him. Relief. Bathing provided the opportunity to wash away the scents of other alphas who might have tried to stake a claim. He needed that, he realized. It was the most utterly foolish thought he'd ever had, but he needed it.

Months of freedom, and the prison's scent lingered in his nose. Misery-soaked stone. The honey and spice of the alpha guards and the scentless beta scent of the torturer. _Qualls_. No scent of his own, but blood and iron, leather and terror all clung to him as much as they did to the prison walls. He wanted to forget that smell, that name.

He knew better than to think that was possible, but here within the ritual, he could wash it all away. He finished shaving and scrubbed his hair clean, the sandalwood scent of his shampoo mingling with the sandalwood of his pheromones, imagining as he did that he scrubbed the memories from his mind along with the dirt from his hair. Ridiculous, but oddly soothing.

Better memories rose with the water as he filled the tub. Heats he'd shared with Nic. Bathhouses and hot springs they'd visited. Sex in the tub. That first night of freedom when Nic bathed his broken body with such loving care.

Tears came to his eyes, and he let them flow. He let the pain pour out like sweat from his pores into the cleansing water. He scrubbed away the smells of the prison with perfumed soap and water scented by fragrant oil. A green and woody scent that complemented both his sandalwood and Nic's cedar, one they had chosen together. It smelled clean, fresh, alive.

He cried while he washed, until the sobs came too hard and too heavy.

Until strong arms wrapped around him, lifting him from the cooling water into the hot flow of the shower, and from there into a soft towel.

"I'm sorry," Nic said. "I keep getting this wrong."

Wolfe could hardly breathe through the sobs, but he made himself speak. Nic needed to understand. "Not wrong."

Nic held him, stroking his hair, until the storm passed.

Awareness of his surroundings was slow to come. The first thing he noticed was how very smooth Nic's chest was against his cheek. His cheek that was rubbing against it, marking his lover's skin with his scent. _My alpha. Mine._ Their mingled scents made his mouth water, and he had an overpowering urge to see how Nic would taste. His tongue was past his lips as soon as he thought it, and he licked his way to a nipple, taking it between his teeth for a light nibble. Yes, delicious.

Nic's hissing breath shook Wolfe's higher mind awake. He was sitting in Nic's lap. Wrapped in a towel. That fold there... was not a fold. That was Nic's cock, so hard it had to be painful. And he was teasing Nic. Embarrassed, he lifted his head, looking up at Nic to apologize. But Nic was smiling.

"Feeling better, are you?" Nic asked, nuzzling the top of Wolfe's head.

Such a powerful wave of cedarsmoke at that. Instinctively, Wolfe offered his neck, and Nic bit. Only gently, not enough. Wolfe whined. His alpha was hard. He could feel his own moisture dampening the towel beneath him. His hips wriggled against the firm arm that held him. He was ready to be claimed.

Claimed. Nic's again, all Nic's. He wanted that very, very badly. But Nic looked worried. Oh, he'd asked a question. If he tried, Wolfe could put together words to answer. "Yes. Much better," he said. "I needed that." He had. And he needed what would come next, too. His body insisted very strongly on that point. "I'm ready now."

Arms shifted, still holding him close while Nic reached down for a quick grope. His fingers went right in, three of them, with room to spare. He could have gotten his whole hand in easily.

Something about that prickled, a thorn of memory, just at the edge of Wolfe's thoughts. Whatever it was, he didn't want to know. "See? Ready," he said, his voice dangerously close to whining.

Bringing his hand back up, Nic licked his fingers, a loud purr rumbling in his chest. "Almost," he said, and a sound that was unmistakably a whine escaped Wolfe in response. "Easy, love, you're a little tense. Let's get you nice and relaxed, hmm?"

That was reasonable. That made sense. His rational mind agreed, even. But he was _empty_. Emptiness _ached_. Ached like memories he didn't want. He heard himself whining again. Felt his hips grinding into Nic's erection through the towel. Pathetic.

He made himself stand. It was cruel to tease Nic, no matter what his instincts told him to do. Leaning on the counter, he considered the things Nic had set out for him. Kohl. Oil. Gold. He reached for the oil. His hands weren't steady enough to fasten clasps or apply kohl, but he could oil his own skin, make it as smooth and soft as Nic's. He poured the thick liquid into his hands, thinking of how good it would feel when their skin slid together.

No, now his hips were jutting out, that was no good. Nic had gone to a lot of trouble to set everything up nicely, and it wouldn't be fair to goad him into... A thing Wolfe was going to stop thinking about. He focused on the task, silently naming the bones and muscles beneath the skin he was touching.

Nic sat for a moment on the closed lid of the toilet, breathing very slowly and deeply before he got up.

Wolfe had almost finished with the oil. He'd done a sloppy job of it, but good enough. The next step, if they followed the ritual, would be a massage with more oil. Nic could cover any spots he'd missed. While he finished with his arms, Nic came to stand at his side, reaching around without touching him to pick up a necklace from the assortment laid out on the counter. A very traditionally Egyptian piece, wide enough to reach almost to his shoulders when Nic placed it around his neck, with an ornately carved image of Hapi, flat-stomached and holding stalks of silphium, as its centerpiece. The omega god of the Nile's flooding usually represented fertility, but in this depiction, he symbolized protection from conception. Hieroglyph-inscribed beads around the image formed the words of an ancient contraceptive spell. Pure superstition, of course, but Wolfe could almost feel the touch of the god's power in his abdomen as Nic fastened the clasps.

"There. That helps, doesn't it?" Nic's voice was low, rough with restrained need, but the hand that smoothed the necklace over Wolfe's chest was gentle. Shaking slightly. Wolfe noticed these things.

Wolfe nodded, considering the jewelry before taking a pair of gold ankh earrings. Sleek and elegant, symbols of eternal life. That seemed fitting. Difficult to put in, though. He kept missing the hole in his ear. Tempting to give up on the entirety of it and beg Nic to take him right there, bent over the counter. Dangerous thinking when they both were clinging to sensible thought by a thread. He kept his hips still and his mouth shut, and he got the damned earring in. He needed this adherence to form. He would need the refuge of history when the more recent past attempted to drown him.

"You're making yourself so beautiful for me," Nic purred. Putting his hands over Wolfe's, he helped guide the second earring into place. "Can I help you with the kohl?"

Part of Wolfe, the frustrated and needy beast in heat, wanted to snarl at that. He couldn't even get an earring in. Of course he couldn't line his eyes properly. But it was kind of Nic to ask, considerate, careful, and that reassured him on a deeper level. Nic was taking good care of him. Nic would keep him safe and comfortable.

Between the two of them, they managed to get Wolfe presentable, his hair brushed, face painted, and his body adorned with gold and jewels. He refused the _shendyt_ that Nic offered. No reason to bother with a garment that would be removed within minutes. Nic stripped his off as well, and they made the walk to the nest together, nude and shining. That felt right somehow. Pure.

Just outside the bathroom door, Nic retrieved the ceremonial sword he'd left there. Leading Wolfe by the hand, Nic walked him through the house, pointing out secured doors and windows. Bookshelves moved to serve as barricades. Unnecessary, all of it. Excessive. And so very, shamefully soothing.

"You are safe here," Nic repeated, over and over in a refrain that loosened muscles Wolfe hadn't even realized had been tense.

They reached the bedroom door, open only a crack, Wolfe's heart hammering harder in his chest than it had when they shared their first heat.

He was safe.

He was afraid.

He needed Nic.

Oh, but he was afraid.

Wrapping an arm around Wolfe's waist, Nic pushed the door open.

Eyes to the floor, Wolfe hesitated until the gentle pressure of Nic's arm against his back carried him forward. The first thing he noticed was the light. Too warm to be glows. Curiosity at that was enough to bring his eyes up.

The glows were on, turned to their lowest setting, but Nic had supplemented them with the warmer light of oil lamps made of beautiful colored glass that let flickering light through while keeping the flames that produced it hidden from view. He remembered the trip to Venice when they'd gotten them. He'd been going into heat, unexpectedly, and neither of them had realized it until after they returned to their room after a walk through the markets and realized that they both had an overpowering urge to redecorate using their new purchases. The lamps weren't the only things they still had from that trip. There, on the bed, were two of the cushions Nic had bought.

The bed. He was walking toward the bed, all on his own now. Faintly, he heard the turning of the lock behind him, but his attention was almost entirely consumed by the bed. Nic had hung the canopy for the first time in years, and the shimmering red silk of it fell around the bed to create a secluded den. The red sheets were on the bed, overlaid by the fur blanket and piles of pillows, small ones stacked near the head of the bed and the largest near the middle, ready for him to drape himself over it. It spoke to him on a primal level of safety and comfort and needs fulfilled.

_It's perfect. Nic made it perfect_, he thought, and at the thought of Nic, he turned. He needed to thank Nic for doing this, while he still had sense enough to speak.

Nic knelt in front of the closed door with the sword on the floor before him. As Wolfe turned, he bowed over the sword. "I offer you care and protection in your time of need," Nic said. "Will you have me?"

Ancient words, spoken with all the solemnity they deserved. Wolfe's knees felt weak, his stomach fluttery. "I will have you," he breathed. "And in exchange, I offer you myself. For as long as you will have me, I am yours." He knew the response by heart, but the words seemed more meaningful now than ever. The acknowledgment of the omega's greater vulnerability struck deep, and he had to reach back to brace himself against the bed to stay upright. 

"It is my honor to accept. For as long as you will have me, you are mine, and I am yours." Nic bowed again, lower, his forehead touching the floor. The alpha humbling himself in recognition of the gift the omega gave and the responsibility that he accepted.

"Forever, dear Nic," Wolfe whispered. Off script, the words welling up from a heart and body both enraptured by the sight of his kneeling alpha. "I would have you forever, in this world and beyond. Come to me, love. Claim me."

Rising with a soldier's athletic ease, lamplight shining on his muscles, Nic came to him. He took Wolfe in his powerful arms with gentle care and guided him back onto the bed, pausing only to close the canopy around them before he sank his teeth into Wolfe's neck in a firm, claiming bite.


	8. Alexandria

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Comfort sex and trauma processing. There are a few flashes of Rome memories, including memories of rape and other violence. Wolfe and Santi have a conversation about some of the things that happened in Rome in earlier chapters.

**March, 2031**

All of Wolfe's intelligence seemed to flee from his mind as Nic's teeth found his neck, the pleasurable pain of it a flash of lightning through his nerves. Nic's smoky cedar scent filled his nose, intoxicating, mingled with his own sandalwood and parchment. He was Nic's. Claimed. Possessed and protected in the nest.

Soft fur rubbed his limbs and silk stroked his stomach as Nic laid him down on the large pillow. Nic offered Wolfe a suede-covered pillow to put under his head, and Wolfe purred his acceptance of that offering, rubbing his cheek against it and savoring the texture. So many good things to feel. Instinctively, he lifted his hips in presentation, waiting for Nic to fill his emptiness.

But Nic didn't move. He stayed kneeling at Wolfe's side, even when Wolfe whined and wiggled his hips. "Easy now," Nic said. "You want your massage, don't you?"

Massage. There was supposed to be a massage, wasn't there? Part of the ritual that had seemed so important mere moments ago. Had he wanted it? Maybe he had. But he was in the nest now, surrounded by pleasant textures and alluring scents and flickering, ethereal light that filtered in through the silk of the canopy.

And he was empty, the pain of it a sharp contrast to all the other pleasurable feelings. The sensation caught in his thoughts like a hook in a fish's mouth. It pulled his mind toward darker places.

Shaking his head, he whined again, fighting to form coherent words. "_No_. Nic. I need you. Now, _please_."

Pathetic. Helpless and pathetic and desperate, and that, too, was a hook in his thoughts, one he couldn't free himself from. He was afraid. So very afraid, not of Nic, not of rutting together, but of the thoughts deep in the dark holes of his mind. He couldn't keep thinking. He needed Nic to make him stop thinking.

His fear made the air smell musty, ruining the perfection of the nest. Tears leaked from his eyes.

Nic bit the back of his neck, and the pain drove back the fear, a little. "Shh, love, all right. Now. Let me get a condom."

A condom. The thought of it at once comforted and unsettled him. The condom was good. But when he thought of why, another hook sank into his mind.

Soft fingers wiped away his tears, and then there was a rustling, weight shifting on the mattress as Nic moved. Wolfe waited as patiently as he could, focusing on his lover's scent until he heard himself purring at the comfort of it. Yes, Nic was coming. Nic would fill him. Soon. So soon.

"Want to stay like this? Or roll over?" Nic asked, moving into place behind Wolfe.

He usually liked to be on his back for the first round. He liked to see Nic's face. But rolling took time. Rolling took effort. He needed Nic _now_. "Like this," he groaned. "Please, Nic."

"Almost ready," Nic assured him, purring as he leaned over to bite Wolfe's neck.

Wolfe could have cried in relief at the first touch to his aching hole, but it wasn't enough. Only Nic's fingers, the texture of them odd. He let out an impatient whine. Didn't Nic know he was ready? He lifted his hips higher, spread his legs wider, squirming, displaying himself. If Nic would just look, he would see...

A warning growl made him go still and whimper in confusion. His alpha wasn't happy with him. Why...? The fingers kept poking, pushing... Oh. The condom. Putting in the condom. Yes, the condom was good. His alpha taking care of him. He purred his appreciation even as the inadequate penetration grated on his nerves and thoughts he didn't want to acknowledge floated beneath the haze of his heat.

The fingers withdrew. Sensitive as he was with heat, Wolfe could feel the material of the condom hanging from him. Behind him, Nic shifted. A soft grunt, a hand fumbling with the dangling condom. A round, thick head at his entrance. A sob of relief welling up, impossible to hold back. 

Teeth closed on Wolfe's neck, firm and possessive, and Nic pressed into him. Slowly. So slowly. Impatient, Wolfe whined, but Nic held his hips, keeping him from moving.

Trapped. A bubble of panic at that, there and gone as Nic filled him. A slow, smooth slide. Loud purring. Strong hands, strong arms, strong teeth, strong scent. His alpha's powerful body engulfing and penetrating him.

He'd been afraid. He couldn't remember why. This was good. This was right. He belonged to his alpha. _His_ alpha.

His alpha, not... A flicker of memory, just beneath the surface of his thoughts. A twinge of fear.

Nic, buried fully within and wrapped around him like a warm alpha blanket, purred in his ear. "You're safe here. I've got you. Chris? Are you with me?" Worry in those last words, over the rumbling undertone of alpha need. 

It took Wolfe a long moment to parse those words with his heat-addled brain. Nic was holding back, holding back for him, an overwhelming display of skill and sacrifice. It was more than Wolfe could bear to think about.

Thinking was more than Wolfe could bear. 

"I'm here," he said, even those two words a struggle. He whined. Squirmed. Ass up. Shoulders down. Neck stretched out. The sandalwood scent of his need filled the air. All things his instincts told him would drive his alpha on. He rocked his hips hard against the hands that held him, whimpering a plea he couldn't form the words to speak. _Like this. Hard. Fast. Now._

_Make me stop thinking._

"You want me wild, do you?" Nic's voice rumbled against him.

Nic's fingers dug in.

Nic's teeth found his neck.

And they were moving, and Wolfe's mind was gone. Instinct took him, blocking out his thoughts and leaving only the impressions of his senses. Fullness. Sandalwood and cedar. Hazy red light. Grunts and moans. Thick, wet sliding. Teeth. His sinking into the pillow. Nic's on his neck, his back. Pressure building.

A guttural cry. Swelling within. Tightening.

Relief.

For a time, he knew nothing but the waves of all-encompassing relief. Pleasure. Fullness. Satisfaction.

It couldn't last. Nothing good ever did. Awareness crept back in, first only of his body, engulfed in Nic's embrace, filled with Nic's knot. His muscles clenched tightly around the thick swell of it, locking them together. Nic's velvet-soft tongue ran over the marks of his bites in soft, lazy strokes accompanied by satisfied purring. Wolfe heard himself purring, too. Smelled the musk of sex amidst the woody scents of their arousal. He could have been happy like that, if not for the whispers of thought and memory that stirred beneath the surface of his heat-drunk mind. There was nothing in particular that woke them. He was comfortable, utterly relaxed save for the internal muscles that held tightly to Nic's knot. The only hurts were the pleasurable kind: the dull ache of well-used muscles and the sharper pains where teeth and nails had left their marks.

He was marked. Possessed. Filled. Claimed. Those should all have been good things, but they'd been tainted by memories of other heats. Heats when it hadn't been Nic on top of him. When he'd been filled and marked by...

One by one, the hooks in his mind pulled tight, dragging submerged terrors to the surface. Musty fear-scent tainted the perfection of the air.

"All right?" Nic asked softly. His cheek rubbed against Wolfe's hair, sending up a wave of protective alpha pheromones.

A deep breath of that was enough to drive back the worst of the rising panic. "No," he whispered, in no state to refuse even the mild suggestion of an order from his alpha, even when Nic had left him the option of denial. "Memories."

"Is there anything I can do?" Nic asked in a voice as soothing as his scent.

_Another voice echoed in a vicious sneer. "You're not going anywhere. I've got you right where you belong, on your knees with a knot in your hole." With it, shadows of feeling. Crushing weight, throbbing pain._

Wolfe couldn't think. He could hardly breathe beneath that weight. "Get off," he said through clenched teeth.

"We can't-" Nic began. "We're still... No. Wait. Hold still. I'll roll us over. You just keep breathing." The weight - the part of it that was real, at least - shifted, tilting toward one side and tugging Wolfe along with it.

_Flashes of images. Stones. Thick, muscular legs. A voice. "Keep him still, I want a go at his mouth." Pain in his throat. Choking._

Panic lanced through Wolfe's chest, and he thrashed, as if he could escape the contents of his own brain. With that came a flare of pain, red-hot and very real, from the tight ring of his entry. Not even a second passed before strong legs clamped around his and an arm wrapped tight around his hips, immobilizing him.

He was on his side, he realized belatedly. Nic had gotten them onto their sides. Nic held him from behind. There was no weight on him. He could breathe.

Shaky, he sucked in a deep lungful of Nic's scent. Fresh-cut cedar with an undertone of smoke.

Nic was talking. "Chris. No. Don't move. You'll hurt yourself." Italian. The sound of it flowed over him like a cool stream in the heat of the desert.

The comfort of it almost made him miss the strain in Nic's voice. Even through the lingering fog of heat and panic, it wasn't hard to work out the cause of that. Nic's cock must have felt like it was being ripped out at the root. Nic deserved better than that.

"Sorry," Wolfe said. Whined, really. He couldn't stop himself from sounding pathetic.

_Couldn't stop himself from hearing the echo of his own voice. "I'm sorry. Please. Please stop. I'll do anything."_

It was over. It was done. He knew that. But even when he forced his eyes open to see the warm, lamp-lit colors of the nest, he felt phantom hands on him. Saw the hazy images of...

A hand ran down his side. Gentle but solid. Real. "You are safe, my love. I am here. Keep breathing. How does this feel?" More long, slow strokes from shoulders to hips.

"Good," he said. It felt good. Better than good. His lover's broad, callused hand felt better on his heat-sensitized skin than all the silk and leather and fur piled beneath him. It felt better even than the fullness of Nic's knot inside him. Still hard, still clasped tightly by his body. A burst of adrenaline could do that, prolong the joining of their bodies in response to a perceived threat to reproductive success.

That thought snagged, and he shivered. An internal condom was safer than an external one on an alpha's knot, but it could still tear. His flailing could have torn it. "Nic," he said, unable to keep the tremor from his voice. "The condom. Is it...?"

"It's fine," Nic said. His hand deviated from its course to tap the amulet of Hapi that Wolfe wore. "You won't conceive. The condom is intact. We've had our shots. No seed of mine will take root in you."

Those words were like another weight off of his body, but his hand was already on his stomach, fingers pressing inward. As if he could have felt the meeting of sperm and egg.

_He'd thought he did. Not the first time or the second, but the third, when Qualls had..._

Enough of that absurd line of thought. It was impossible to feel the movements of individual cells. He'd been more than half mad, and he wasn't going to go back to that. He wasn't going to conceive again, either.

He was shaking, and Nic was petting him again, slow and soft. The rhythm of it drew his attention, and for all that he often cursed his omega sensitivity to touch, he was too worn out to be anything but grateful. It was stupid to be so easily soothed by simple physical contact, but it was a better kind of stupid than the other kinds his broken mind was prone to. This kind of stupid, at least, let the tension in his body ease.

Cold crept in with panic's retreat, as it always did, but Nic was ready for that. He wrapped the fur blanket around them both - Wolfe couldn't help but moan at the barrage of sensation - and held Wolfe close against the heat of his body. He had to be overheating like that, but when Wolfe looked over his shoulder with a wordless hum of a question, Nic only purred in answer. "Don't worry about me. How do you feel?"

That was a complicated question, though Nic probably didn't mean it that way. "Warm. Good," he said. Those were the surface. The blanket's comfortable weight and soft texture. The trails of hot relief left across shoulders and abdomen by Nic's petting and kisses. The fullness that sated his instinctive craving. But Nic hadn't only asked about the surface, and beneath that... He whined, lost for words. The memory of his senses was no easy thing to explain. Even thinking of it made him squirm with discomfort.

"Ssh, I know. It's my knot, isn't it? I'll pull out as soon as I can." Nic nuzzled his neck, raising both their scents together. Another thing Wolfe's stupid animal brain answered to all too well.

He could have let the subject drop at that. Nic knew what he needed, Nic was taking care of him, that was enough. But the wording grated on both Wolfe's Scholarly pedantry and his heat-driven idolization of everything about his alpha, especially his alpha's knot. Rather contradictory impulses, under normal circumstances, but they came together with the primal sense of safety that came from being in his alpha's embrace, urging him to say, "Not your knot." Then, more quietly, "I- In the prison..." he swallowed around a lump forming in his throat. This wasn't something they'd talked about.

Nic froze, just for an instant, then his hand resumed its stroking, and he gave Wolfe a gentle bite. Steadying. "It's all right, love. You can tell me."

But he couldn't. Not until the soothing rhythm of Nic's petting found its way inside him and his sphincter unclenched, allowing Nic to slide, knot still half-hard, free of him.

"My body held onto them, too. The alphas. In the prison." His voice sounded very far away. As if it were emanating from that dark hole. "They took me from behind."

A quiet intake of breath was Nic's only response.

"I tried to fight," he said, both because it was true and because Nic needed to know that time, at least, hadn't been a conscious betrayal. "But there were two of them. I was weak. Hurt. I couldn't... I'm sorry." He didn't even know what he was apologizing for. For failing. For breaking. For bringing these horrors into the sanctity of their nest.

"No." Nic moved, and for a panicked instant Wolfe thought he was leaving, or worse, that he'd never really been there at all, until Nic clambered over him to lie face to face. Their noses touched. Their eyes met, and the look in Nic's was so sincere that it was almost unbearable to continue meeting them, but impossible to turn away. "Don't tell me you're sorry. Never apologize to me for anything that happened in that hell. You aren't to blame for any of it."

Bitter laughter welled up, dangerously close to tears. "You're wrong about that," he snarled. Saw the hurt in Nic's eyes, though the venom in his voice had been meant for himself.

"Christopher." Nic cupped Wolfe's cheek, speaking in an infuriatingly patient tone. "You cannot tell me you blame yourself for failing to fight off two alphas after being tortured."

"Of course I don't. That's absurd. But for being a damned fool and mistaking the torturer for you?" Wolfe snapped, turning his head into the pillow so he wouldn't have to see the betrayal on Nic's face. "For going knowingly and willingly to his bed when he propositioned me again? Tell me, Niccolo, how am I not to blame for _that_?"

He couldn't see Nic's face, but he did hear Nic's horrified gasp. He did feel Nic go very still, save for the fingers that curled against Wolfe's face as if to form a fist. "The torturer," Nic said quietly.

"His name was Qualls. Thomas Qualls. Not a Scholar, but working under the Artifex." Wolfe was speaking, but it felt like it was someone else's voice. He couldn't feel his lips moving. He could hardly feel his body at all. "He oversaw the prison. Asked the questions." He'd felt this way during questioning sometimes. When he was very lucky. As if the pain was not his own.

"He tortured you." Nic's voice was flat, emotionless. Bleak.

"Yes." Against the blank canvas of the pillow, he saw hard stone. Cold steel and hot iron. Unable to look up at Nic, he rolled onto his back and watched the flicker of the lamps through the translucent silk of the bed canopy. "It wasn't always violent. He used deception. Lies. Once, he lit cedar incense and served drugged tea. I was a fool and fell for it." His eyes burned, but no tears came. Only laughter, cruel and mocking. "He wasn't even an alpha. A fucking beta, and I fell for it."

"Is that what he made you think?" There was emotion in Nic's voice now, but Wolfe couldn't parse it. "Chris. You can't blame yourself for-"

"Can't I?" he growled, hackles up, lip curling back from his teeth. "Should I also not blame myself for the time I knew exactly who I was presenting for? I whored myself for a cup of tea and a hot bath and a few hours of relief. Tell me that wasn't a betrayal of everything we are to one another."

"Stop it. Enough." The bed shook as Nic sat up, flooding the nest with the smoky scent of his anger. "I'll kill him. I'll hunt him down and tear him limb from limb. I'll feed him his own balls. I'll pull his entrails out through his throat." More frightening than the smell of Nic's rage was the deadly calm of his voice. A calm of clenched fists and bared teeth.

"He let me go, in the end," Wolfe said, as if that would do anything to cool Nic's fury.

With a wordless howl, Nic launched himself to his feet, shoving the bed canopy aside. There was a loud rip, a louder clatter of metal, and torn silk drifted down onto Wolfe's face. A growl, another loud metallic sound, and heavy footsteps on the floorboards. Anger-scent like a trail of smoke in his wake.

Wolfe lay frozen. It was all he could do to resist the voice of instinct telling him to appease the angry alpha. Present. Offer his neck. Make himself small.

He wasn't going to be that helpless, mindless animal. Not anymore. He forced himself upright just in time to see Nic slam the heel of his hand into the wall with a shouted Italian invective.

The sound made him flinch. Gritting his teeth, he pushed away the blanket and the fallen canopy and reached for the bottle of wine on the table beside the bed. The platter of refreshments that Nic had so dutifully prepared lay scattered on the floor. His shaking hands fumbled with the corkscrew. Dropped it. Watched it slide from bed to floor. At that sound, too, he flinched. Reflexively, he closed his eyes.

Useless. After all this time, he was still broken, still mad. Completely out of his mind, to tell an alpha in rut about _that_. Of course Nic would feel driven to fight off a threat to his omega. Or a challenge to his claim. The fact that by now Qualls would be very, very far from Alexandria would hardly be relevant to Nic's alpha hindbrain. No more relevant than it was to Wolfe's own broken mind.

Nic was kneeling in front of him. When had that happened? He'd thought he only blinked. Absently, he wondered how much time he'd lost. Likely only a minute or two; Nic would look more worried if it had been longer. He'd lost longer much stretches, in the prison. When he'd been very, very lucky.

Nic knelt with his head bowed. Making himself small. He'd suppressed his scent sufficiently that Wolfe detected only lingering traces of it beneath his own fear-stench. An impressive feat for an alpha in rut, but then, Nic's control always had been impressive. He was speaking, very softly, in a steady refrain. "I'm not going to hurt you. I'm not going to let anyone hurt you. Breathe, my love. Nice and slow. Come back to me."

"I'm back," Wolfe said. Barely a whisper.

Nic lowered his head further. "I'm sorry," he said. "That was about the worst thing I could have done, wasn't it?"

"I can think of worse," Wolfe replied. He was very good at that now, unfortunately.

Even with his lover's face toward the floor, Wolfe spotted Nic's grimace. "I've broken my promise to care for you. You would be within your rights to banish me from the nest."

"Don't be ridiculous." He couldn't make his voice half as sharp as he wanted it to be. "You're in rut. You're protective. I could hardly expect you to take what I told you quietly." He held out his hands, noticing belatedly that he still had the wine bottle clutched in a death-grip. Hardly the reassuring gesture he'd intended, but Nic seemed to understand, carefully extracting the bottle and setting it aside before clasping Wolfe's hands.

"And you're in heat, and vulnerable, and you deserve to feel safe. Now more than ever." From fingertip to wrist, Nic kissed Wolfe's hands. Feather-light brushes of lips, avoiding the scent glands at the wrists. "I shouldn't have lost control of myself. It won't happen again."

It was like a strange dream to see Nic like this, scentless and humbled and non-threatening. It rubbed on Wolfe's raw nerves in a way he didn't care for in the least. "Oh, come here," he muttered, giving Nic's hands an upward tug.

Nic came in a single fluid motion from floor to bed. He wrapped an arm around Wolfe, and at that, Wolfe folded against his lover, head finding that comfortable place on Nic's shoulder within nuzzling range of his scent gland. A moment of rubbing nose against neck, cheek against shoulder, and Nic released his scent to mingle with Wolfe's. 

There. That was good. That was better.

From so close to Nic, Wolfe's heat-sensitized nose could pick out every subtle note of his alpha's fragrance. How had he ever mistaken incense smoke for this rich, complex bouquet? He shuddered to think how far he'd sunk into madness, and Nic stroked his back, his arms, his hair. The kind of slow, soft touch that his omega instincts responded so well to. His own hand wandered over Nic's smooth-waxed body, mapping battle scars. The gunshot from Moscow. Two from Paris. Ridges that had been wounds. There'd been a time when Nic had more of them than Wolfe did.

"Do you remember what I told you, when you'd first come home? When you started bleeding?" Nic asked, resting his head against Wolfe's. He didn't wait for an answer. "I said I wouldn't blame you for seeking relief from another alpha. The point stands, even if he was a beta. You did nothing wrong."

Wolfe didn't answer, not right away. It took a long moment to fight back the memories enough to say, "This isn't only about sex. I sold out colleagues for a night's sleep. Friends of the Artifex, but even they didn't deserve that. I did work on a weapon - a terrible, forbidden weapon - just to keep my fingernails a day longer. I-" There were more examples, an interminable list, but his voice faltered, and he turned his head into Nic's shoulder.

Nic's arms tightened around Wolfe, but the kiss he pressed to the top of Wolfe's head was very gentle. "It must have been terrible to be so helpless," he said softly.

_To be so helpless._ The thought sank as a stone in the sea, down past the choppy waves of conscious thought, past the shadowy horrors that lurked below, down into the darkest depths that Wolfe feared to acknowledge, let alone probe. Into the shattered ruins of the man he'd once been. Before he broke. Before they broke him.

He let out a choked cry, somewhere between a howl and a sob. Nic had seen right into him. Nic understood. Somehow, he always did.

It was easier to blame himself than to admit to himself that he'd never had the control he'd imagined he did. His answers to the questions never mattered. Truths, lies, silence, obedience, disobedience, none of it had _mattered_. Nothing stopped the questions. Nothing stopped the pain.

He'd been powerless until the night he stumbled back into Nic's arms.

In those arms, he trembled, nauseous with memory, while his eyes burned with tears that refused to fall. He clung to Nic with all his strength, and Nic held him, stroked him, whispered a steady refrain of reassurances in his ear until he found his voice again.

"It really doesn't bother you?" he asked in a voice that sounded too thick to his ears. "That I let him...?"

"No," Nic said. Firm. Decisive as he always was. "Oh, it bothers me plenty that he did those things to you," Nic added as Wolfe looked up at him, searching his face and finding only pure, honest love. A wisp of smoky anger trailed up from Nic's scent glands, quickly replaced by protective cedarwood. "But I wouldn't say you let him do anything. You survived. You picked your battles. There's no shame in that."

Picked his battles. He'd thought of it that was himself, the night when...

Wolfe drew in a shaky breath and let it slowly out again. "Thank you. For that perspective. I needed that." Wolfe looked away from the intensity of his lover's gaze and added, "And I need a drink." This was all too much to take without wine.

Nic's brow furrowed, only for an instant, as it often did when Wolfe suggested self-medication. He quickly covered it with a smile and said, "Of course."

The corkscrew hadn't fallen far, and Nic had the bottle open soon enough, but the silver goblets he'd set out had rolled halfway across the room to lie in the scattered mess of food from the overturned platter. With a sigh, Nic said, "Let me get all that cleaned up. I've got another plate in the icebox."

More likely another two plates, knowing Nic's nesting urges, but Wolfe didn't at all care for the idea of letting his alpha out of arm's reach long enough to pick up so much as a single goblet. He caught Nic's arm before Nic could rise more than halfway. "No. Stay. I'm not hungry."

Entirely too conspicuously, Nic sniffed the air as he sat back down. He passed the bottle to Wolfe without comment, which was as good as announcing that he'd detected the pheromone signals of another approaching peak. Wolfe couldn't even say his partner was wrong; the sensitivity of his skin, his craving for touch, even his wetness could be merely baseline symptoms of heat, but there was a growing feeling of emptiness and need that he wasn't quite ready to acknowledge yet.

Well, that was the inevitable outcome of plastering himself to his alpha, wasn't it? Wolfe took a deep drink, intending to swallow quickly but instead hesitating as the intensity of flavor hit him. Oak, dark fruit, something deep and earthy beneath the twin bites of tannin and alcohol. Gods, that was good, and he was further gone than he'd realized to be so captivated by his senses, half drunk already on a cocktail of heat hormones and adrenaline. Probably a bad idea to add alcohol to all of that, but he took another drink all the same.

Beside him, Nic moved again, this time leaning forward to grab a basket from the table. "Bread survived," Nic said, pulling aside the folded napkin and unleashing the aromas of rosemary and garlic and fresh-baked bread. Beneath the napkin lay a loaf of focaccia, already cut into bite-sized cubes. Offering a piece to Wolfe, Nic said, with utmost seriousness, "I offer you nourishment in this moment of rest."

The words of the ancient mating ritual again, turning the act of sharing food into a symbolic display of the alpha's ability to provide for a mate. Absurdly archaic to suggest that Wolfe might need providing for - even now, he drew a gold-band Scholar's salary thanks to his lifetime contract - but the familiarity of them was soothing. As was playing his part and accepting the offering, licking salt from Nic's fingers as Nic placed the bread on his tongue. Rich with oil and savory herbs, it melted in his mouth, and he washed it down with a sip of wine.

He might have sat and contemplated the melding of those flavors for some time, but already Nic held another piece of bread out to him. He took it as much from instinct as from the rational knowledge that he would do well to eat before the next peak came. There was a part of him that bristled at Nic's alpha doting, grumbling in the back of his mind that he'd said he wasn't hungry, but the larger part of him was all too glad to yield. He felt wrung out and scoured raw, and it was _nice_ to lean on his alpha's shoulder and have delicious morsels fed to him. If only for a little while.

(There, too, was the quiet whisper from the depths, warning that meals were rare and not to be squandered. The echo of a desperate beast that knew hunger pangs and emptiness too well to ever forget them.)

(That wasn't him. Not ever again.)

A deep breath of Nic's scent drove back the looming darkness, and he took another gulp of wine. Thus fortified, Wolfe climbed into his lover's lap and caught Nic's mouth in a deep and deliciously distracting kiss. Nic gave a lovely little gasp of surprise before his arms found their way around Wolfe's back and his hands found their way into Wolfe's hair, and he kissed back with all the ferocity of an alpha asserting his claim. Arousal scents rose, mingled. More physical indicators of arousal rose as well. Teeth scraped lips, tongues. Wolfe tilted his head, at once offering his neck to Nic and angling for a bite of his own. There it was, the meeting of neck and shoulder, tanned skin and firm muscle and heavy cedarwood scent. Wolfe sank his teeth in and moaned around his mouthful of Nic as Nic did the same, each claiming the other.

He'd forgotten how good Nic tasted. Flesh and sweat and the indescribable flavor of alpha. _His_ alpha.

Nic was the first to let go. "Feels good to have a proper bite from you again. Haven't had that in a while," he said, purring as he nuzzled Wolfe's cheek. "I was going to offer you that massage again, but you're already too far along, aren't you?"

"Might be," Wolfe mumbled against his partner's neck. Gently, he licked the mark he'd left. He hadn't drawn blood - Nic's skin was thick enough to make that something of a challenge - but the indentation went deep enough that it ought to bruise beautifully. That would be satisfying to see. He hadn't really thought about it, but Nic was right; he hadn't marked Nic much as of late, though he'd asked to be marked often enough. That inequity would have to be addressed.

He lifted his head, intending to give Nic a matching bite on the other side, but Nic was faster, catching Wolfe by the hair to pull him in for another bruising kiss. The intensity of it raced like lightning along his nerves, and his hips ground against Nic of their own accord. At that, an explosion of sensation that made him groan into Nic's mouth, and an overpowering urge to move, to wriggle, to push Nic back. Nic's cock slipped against his own. That was wrong. It needed to be...

Firm hands on his shoulders pulled him back, and he looked up, blinking as his eyes refocused on Nic's face. Gods, Nic was gorgeous. As was Nic's voice, deep and rumbling with desire. "Want to be on top this time?"

Answering took thought. Wolfe bit his lip, biting back an instinctive urge to agree if only because it would get Nic into him faster. They were so close. If he just lifted his hips, slid... Yes, he could have Nic in him, and in this position, he would have greater control over their coupling. But therein lay the trouble. Even though the growing heat-haze, he could see the cracks in his own mind, and he hadn't forgotten how he'd thrashed in momentary panic during their first joining. If that happened again... He shook his head. "Not on top. On my back."

"All right." Nic's hands slid down from Wolfe's shoulders. Down to his ribs. His waist. His hips. "Going to need to check you over before we start. Want to get yourself comfortable first?"

Something about that nagged at Wolfe. Not just the accursed alpha fussing, which was understandable if irritating, but the idea of being checked in and of itself. The thought of being subject to inspection, perhaps. Wolfe took a final drink and stood to retrieve the cork and put the half-empty bottle back on the table. "Just get it over with."

"Doesn't have to be a chore," Nic said, smiling. He patted his lap. "Come here."

Hardly more than a year ago, he would have taken Nic up on that invitation gladly. He'd found a great deal of pleasure bent over Nic's lap. But there was another memory now, one he'd fought hard to bury, dredged up by the talk of the prison and Qualls.

_Another lap. A bone-thin hand. Fullness that was both violation and relief.  
_

"No. Not like that." Shaking his head to clear it, he climbed onto the bed. Sat firmly on his heels while he moved scattered pillows back into their proper places.

From the corner of his eye, he saw Nic gather the torn and fallen piece of the bed canopy. Heard Nic take in a long breath and let it out again before standing on the edge of the bed to reattach the silk. "Sorry," Nic said. "I take it that's another position to avoid?"

Wolfe nodded, ignoring the idiotic omega urge to explain himself to his alpha. Nic didn't need to hear that particular detail. Wolfe didn't want to remember it, let alone speak of it.

There were better things to think about. Like the lovely picture Nic made as he tucked and tied the edges of the canopy back into place. The thin red silk, transparent enough that the dark ink of Nic's tattoos showed through, fell halfway across his body, draping over muscles tight with the effort of holding his position and rippling with the movement of dexterous hands. The edge of it lay against Nic's erection, as if that was necessary to draw Wolfe's eyes to the thick shaft and rut-swollen balls. Hairless, rut-swollen balls.

The pillows were arranged quite well enough, Wolfe thought, and he crawled toward his lover, drawn by that display of alpha beauty and virility. It clearly wasn't appealing to any sane part of him, such clear evidence of increased sperm production, but he saw no good reason not to lick his way up a firm, bulging thigh and draw one of those dangling globes into his mouth.

Nic groaned, but held his position.

Each testicle got a good, long suck as Wolfe savored the shape and the texture of them, even the taste. Salty sweat seasoned with scent oil from the glands in Nic's groin, as good an aphrodisiac to an omega in heat as there could be. From there Wolfe moved on to the shaft, lapping at it with long strokes until Nic swore in Italian and pulled away.

"Keep that up and I'm going to blow my load on your face," Nic muttered as he climbed down to gather Wolfe into his arms. The canopy hung askew, but didn't fall.

"Impossible," Wolfe replied while Nic laid him back on the pillows; slowly, tenderly, kissing him all the while. Between kisses, Wolfe continued, "You're in rut. You can't achieve orgasm without penetration any more than I can, although in the opposite role."

"Mmm. Lecture me more," Nic said, pulling back from the kiss and licking his lips. With a glance down toward Wolfe's lower half he asked, "Can I have a look at you now? You can correct my ignorance while I do it."

Wolfe knew exactly what his lover was doing, distracting him while performing a necessary task Wolfe had shown aversion to, but obvious though the ruse was, he was grateful for it. While Nic kissed his way down Wolfe's body, Wolfe glared down his nose at his partner and expounded on the physiological effects of heat and rut. When Nic reached his groin, he opened his legs and kept talking, watching Nic's face. There was the predictable concern, but also concentration Wolfe could imagine was on his words rather than his body, and arousal Wolfe knew he was inspiring. Nic always had liked listening to him lecture. He still felt the probing fingers, but only Nic's fingers. The memories stayed in their holes and left him at peace. Soon enough, Nic pronounced him undamaged and ready, a new condom in place.

Nic came back up to lean over Wolfe and end the lecture with a soft kiss. Resting his weight on his elbows, he cupped Wolfe's face with both hands and smiled down at him, nose to nose, eye to eye. "Comfortable?"

In answer, Wolfe pulled his lover in for another kiss. He felt as if he had drained the well of his words in speaking of the prison and his lecturing had dredged its last drops. In this, at least, his body could speak for him. Loose muscles and even breathing could tell how good it felt to lounge on soft pillows with his alpha's hard body above him. A soft, yielding mouth could hint at other places that Nic would find soft and yielding and waiting to be filled. Legs, too, could speak of that need, wrapping tight around Nic's waist. He'd been able to get them up onto Nic's shoulders when he'd been younger, more flexible, but that was an impossibility now.

It wasn't worth dwelling on things that were impossible now.

"Going to take it slow this time," Nic said. His erection rubbed against Wolfe's crack, light and teasing despite the insistent pressure of Wolfe's legs. "Go on and guide me in, if you're ready."

In this, too, Nic's intent was obvious. Giving Wolfe greater control. He couldn't be anything but grateful for it, even if it did mean having to unwind his arms from around his partner's neck to grasp Nic's thick alpha shaft and hold the condom open for him. There was a certain comfort in feeling the outer ring of the condom as Nic pressed at his entrance, knowing that everything was in place.

A far greater comfort in feeling himself stretch to accommodate the round swell of Nic's head. His body drew Nic in, hungry for him, not sated until he felt Nic's balls against his skin and there was no longer any distance at all between their bodies. By instinct, he tipped his head back to offer his neck, and a cry of pure relief welled up from his throat when Nic's teeth sank in, powerful and possessive. He was Nic's. All Nic's, never anyone's but Nic's. And Nic was his. He dug his nails into Nic's broad shoulders and dragged them down his lover's back hard enough that Nic groaned, the sound of it vibrating against Wolfe's throat. He kept his nails longer than he used to, these days; they would leave a mark.

Very gently, Nic ran his thumbs across Wolfe's cheekbones, the tenderness a strange contrast to the sharp claims of nails and teeth. For a second, Wolfe didn't understand it, until he felt the slip of wet skin.

The tears that had refused to fall while they talked were now flowing.

"It's all right, my love," Nic murmured, resting his forehead against Wolfe's. He held himself very still save for the even rhythm of his breathing. Not so much as a twitch of his hips, though it must have been agony to hold himself within Wolfe without following the instinctive urge to thrust.

Wolfe had to fight the lump in his throat to choke out, "Sorry. I'm sorry. You don't have to-"

A light peck of a kiss cut him off. "Shh. Yes I do. I promised I'd take care of you, remember?" Nic smiled, but his eyes looked wet.

"I've made you fight your instincts enough," Wolfe whispered on what felt like the last thread of his voice.

Nic shook his head, his smile widening. "I am fighting nothing, my love. You are my omega, and the drive to protect you is every bit as strong as any other instinct. I want you to be safe with every fiber of my being. Whatever you need, Christopher, my heart, I will do."

As if to prove the truth of his words, the scent of fresh-cut cedar filled the air. The scent of Nic's protection, carrying with it memories of safety. It was the smell of being shielded from danger, dragged behind cover under fire, being held through the night when nightmares lay in wait. The scent of careful hands on his bleeding body. Even that memory was tinged in warmth, now. Inhaling deeply, Wolfe felt the safety of those memories sink into his core, and with it, the surety of a love so great he felt he might burst with it. Whatever he needed, Nic had said. What he needed was Nic. Nothing but Nic. Clinging to his alpha with arms and legs wrapped tight, he rocked his hips in invitation and whispered, "Nic. Nic. Nic." It was the only word he had left. The only word that mattered.

"Yes," Nic purred. "I am here." He carried the motion Wolfe had begun into a long, slow thrust, pausing at the top of the wave to look down at Wolfe in question.

Wolfe answered by tightening his legs to pull his alpha in once more.

Like waves on a calm sea, they rolled against one another, building toward a climax as unhurried and inevitable as the tides. It was not the frenzied madness of their first peak, but it was wild all the same, as full of teeth and nails as any joining of alpha and omega, but also full of softer touches, for those, too, were demanded by instinct. It was a coupling at once fierce and tender, and it did not so much silence Wolfe's thinking mind as push it firmly to the side, out of the way while the needs of heart and body took precedence.

Their mouths came together, needing to taste, claim, comfort. Steadying bites after breathless kisses, velvety tongues on marked skin.

Tears flowed, and Nic wiped then away with fingers light and sure.

Wolfe raked his nails down his lover's back, slow as a gentle caress.

Nic's fingers threaded through Wolfe's hair, traced shoulders and collarbones.

Purring, Wolfe nuzzled into his lover's shoulder as Nic filled him with deep strokes to soothe the aches of emptiness and need.

There was no increase in speed as climax neared, only an increase in focus. Wolfe saw it in his lover's eyes, first, and then in the tightness of Nic's jaw, soon mirrored in his own. His teeth clenched and he whined, desperate, as Nic pulled back, half-formed knot stretching him as it slipped free. Another stretch as the head of Nic's cock reached his entrance, out and back in, a barrage of sensation that pushed Wolfe to the edge. Head back against the pillows, fingers digging into Nic's shoulders, Wolfe let it wash over him, a wave crashing to shore.

Another wave as Nic struck sensitive nerves on his inward thrust.

Another as Nic's knot pushed its way in, and Wolfe's body locked around it.

More as Nic reached his climax, knot swollen to its full size, teeth clamped onto Wolfe's shoulder.

Holding tight to his beloved alpha, Wolfe let the tide roll in.

There was no distance between them anymore. They were one body, panting, reverberating with feeling. Sandalwood mixed with smoke, cedar with parchment, the scents together forming something sacred, as if their nest had become a Serapeum all their own, a temple to honor the knowledge they shared of one another. Through half-lidded eyes, Wolfe looked up at his alpha, into eyes that shone green in the lamplight, all the more beautiful for the smudged kohl around them, and a face exhausted but satisfied, sun-browned skin glistening with a sheen of sweat. He purred. Nic purred. The sounds harmonized, blurred together.

It came not as a surprise when a shard of unwelcome sense memory crept into the peace of their repose, but as a nuisance. Like a fly buzzing in a quiet study, the sensations of other knots, other hands, imposed themselves over the pleasant fullness of Nic's knot, refusing to be forgotten. Insistent though they were, Wolfe had no intention of giving in to them. Not again. "Nic," he said, not at all liking the brittle sound of his own voice.

Nic must have heard it, too, because his eyes took on a renewed focus, eyebrows drawing together as he said, "What do you need, my love?" With one hand, he lazily stroked Wolfe's shoulder.

Nic always had been able to read him well.

"That," Wolfe said, "You. Your hand. Touch me, pet me, like that, yes." He had none of his eloquence in this state, but also no shame. Clumsy words spilled out of him, and he didn't care, because Nic was stroking him, and Nic was smiling, and that told him on a primal level that all was well.

It hadn't been anything like this, in the prison. There hadn't been smiles and soft touches and purrs. Even Qualls, though he'd been gentle, hadn't been kind. Even in his deepest delusions, Wolfe hadn't ever really felt safe.

He felt safe now. More than safe. Loved and protected. Safe even from his own mind. The memories were still there. The memories would always be there. But they seemed less threatening now, less tangible. He felt only Nic, around him and inside him, filling and protecting him.

As if he'd read Wolfe's mind, Nic murmured, "They can't hurt you anymore. I am here."

"I know." Wolfe reached up to touch his lover's face, still smooth from the razor, though likely not for much longer. He remembered cold nights spent imagining that face, clinging to the flimsy comfort the illusion had been able to give, nothing compared to the reality of running his fingers through the short, sweat-drenched hair that clung to Nic's forehead. The memory ached, but it was a dull ache, like an old and fading scar. More clearly, he remembered stumbling through his door to see Nic's face again, the pure relief of it.

That, he thought, was something like what he felt now. Relief. Bone deep relief.

He hardly realized his eyes were closing until he heard Nic's voice, purring, "Rest, love. I will watch over you."

Wolfe's eyes lingered a moment longer on the mossy green of his partner's eyes before falling shut. He felt his body loosening, breathing slowing and deepening, mind going hazy. His hand fell from Nic's hair to land on the pillow. His legs uncurled from Nic's waist. Only one part remained tight, holding fast to Nic's knot, and in that moment, he would have been content never to let go. Half drunk on the scent of cedarsmoke sweat, sated and safe, he drifted into sleep.


	9. Rome

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dead dove do not eat.
> 
> I am isolating this scene in its own chapter because it is completely horrible, even by the standards of this fic. This is a detailed Rome flashback in which Wolfe remembers being impregnated by Qualls. If you want to really stretch definitions, you could call it dubcon, but let's be honest here, Wolfe's agreement was coerced. 
> 
> This fills the following prompts from Maz's kinktober list: Feminisation | Anal Fisting | Impregnation <strike>Fantasy</strike>. It also fills the following prompts from my whumptober list: fever | fists | unwanted pregnancy. Read it as whump, kink, or both.
> 
> Or don't read it. Seriously, all content warnings apply here.

**June, 2030**

The worst thing about it was that Qualls wasn't cruel. It would have been easier if Qualls were cruel. Then Wolfe could have honestly said that he hated every moment.

Instead, Qualls took his hands gently and guided him to the bed, murmuring soft encouragement along the way. He sat Wolfe down and stripped away his soiled prison clothes with exquisite care, mindful of tender bruises and open wounds. He smoothed back Wolfe's tangled hair, and Wolfe couldn't help leaning into the touch. It felt good. It made every inch of his skin that Qualls wasn't touching crawl, but it felt good.

"You're so warm. You must have been sweltering in those clothes," Qualls said in a voice like silk-wrapped steel. "Don't be afraid, Scholar. I know what you need. You remember the lessons I have been teaching you, do you not?"

Wolfe shivered. He remembered. Hard to forget when they were so freshly written on his body.

"Good," Qualls said. His hands - thin, cold, and gentle - stroked Wolfe's shoulders. "The Library knows what you need, and if you are obedient, the Library will provide. That is why I have brought you here. To provide for your needs. Can you present for me, Scholar Wolfe?"

He couldn't refuse. He thought he might be sick, guilt and shame and revulsion churning in his guts, but he obeyed. Closing his eyes, he let himself collapse back onto the bed, and with a groan of pain, he tried to draw his legs up and part them. He couldn't do it. The pain was too much. He was too weak. For a moment, even as the pain brought him to tears, he hoped and feared that his body's failure would put a stop to it all.

But Qualls was there, gently helping him to roll over onto his stomach. "There, it's easier this way, isn't it? Try again, Scholar Wolfe. Present for me." Cold, soft hands stroked his thighs, brushing his bare ass.

Tears rolled down his cheeks. Pain, humiliation, helpless rage. But his body was already moving, instinctively responding to the torturer's touch. This far into his heat, it answered even to a beta.

He got his knees under him. Spread them. Lifted, not much, but enough to show that he was open and oozing and ready. Aching to be filled.

For his trouble, he got a single thin finger, slowly circling his entrance. He whined, felt the muscles in his thighs and stomach tense as if to thrust his hips back, only to go slack, useless to do more than tremble.

"Patience," Qualls said, and the finger continued its orbit.

Wolfe's head swam. Nothing was right about this. Nothing at all. He presented but wasn't filled. Offered his neck and wasn't bitten. Gave off omega scent but smelled no alpha. There should have been alpha scent, rich, smoky cedar.

_Nic_.

He let out a choked wail, as much wild omega mourning as heartbroken anguish. He was doing the only thing he could do, and still mind and body alike knew it was wrong, wrong, wrong.

"Shh. No more of that. You must be patient. Greed and impatience are your greatest flaws. You must learn to resist them. Crying will get you nothing."

Silence did not come easily. It was only natural for an omega to vocalize his needs, particularly when those needs went unmet. It was only natural for a broken man to sob in defeat. The small, fragile part of him that held onto sense was in no hurry to hasten the coming violation, and the mad beast that was more and more of him could not comprehend the concept of restraint. Silence came not of any conscious effort, but of heat-heightened senses. Something moved behind him. Fabric rustled. Skin moved over skin. He went quiet, alert, listening.

The effort of lifting his head enough to look was inconceivable, but Wolfe knew by the sound and by the faint musk of beta arousal that carried to his nose. Qualls was stroking himself. Preparing. Wolfe held his breath in equal parts anticipation and terror.

As had become routine, Qualls assigned meaning of his own to Wolfe's silence. "Yes, that's right. Patience is rewarded." The mattress creaked as Qualls moved into place behind Wolfe, the silk of his robe soft on Wolfe's skin as he leaned over to hold Wolfe by the back of the neck.

Held by the scruff like a child. Like a kitten. The indignity of it brought Wolfe's already feverish blood to a boil, but he couldn't move. His mind and muscles had come uncoupled, the latter ruled entirely by instinct, and instinct said to obey the one who held him. In the desperation of heat, his body was granting this beta the authority of an alpha. There was no alpha scent, no bite, but there was a tight grip on his neck and a cock taking the place of the finger at his hole, and that, evidently, was enough.

Qualls slid in easily, stroking Wolfe's side with his free hand, and Wolfe's traitorous body purred at it. He was full. If not claimed, at least commanded. If not held, at least petted, comforted by touch.

It had been so long since human hands had given him anything but pain. So long since he'd felt anything resembling pleasure that the feeling of the torturer's slow thrusts bordered on incomprehensible. It felt good. So good. Waves of it, pulsing from the ring of his entrance to his farthest depths, making his cock throb in sympathy. A feeling strong enough to drive the ever-present pain to the margins of his awareness. Gratitude for that relief swelled within him, almost painful.

Almost enough to drown out the part of him that screamed in silent rage as his hands clenched into fists he would never find the strength or will to swing. So small that thinking part of him had grown. So distant, swept away by the flood of hormones. Easier to let go of that. Retreat behind the shield of his animal mind.

Better not to think about whose hand held his neck in a firm grip that spoke of safety. Better not to think of whose voice he heard, gentle but insistent over the squelching of sex. "So obedient now. It feels good to obey, doesn't it? That's right. Be a good omega and you'll be taken care of."

There was meaning to those words, but Wolfe didn't try to parse it. The tone was what mattered. Pleased tone. That meant happy alpha.

No, not alpha. Beta. The only thing a poor, abandoned omega could have. No thick alpha shaft or knot to complete him, but a beta cock, no bigger than his own. He whined, mournful, his sandalwood scent growing thicker in the air, undercut by moldy parchment.

"Hush, Scholar. It is not your place to complain," the beta's voice chided, and the hand on Wolfe's neck tightened, the pressure oddly soothing. "That's it. Quiet down."

Wolfe felt his body loosening, the fight going out of him. Beta was filling him. No alpha, but better than being empty. Pleased beta voice, soft petting, good signs.

"Yes, that's how an omega should be," Qualls said, something changing in the timbre of his voice. His thrusts quickened. "Hot and wet and fertile and obedient."

Arousal. That was arousal. Wolfe felt it, too, as the beta thrust harder, striking the sensitive places inside him. Pressure grew, and he felt his inner muscles contract, grasping for a knot that wasn't there. Only a smooth, slippery shaft that plunged in and out without regard for his need.

Qualls grunted and went still.

Wolfe whimpered, confused. Didn't this beta know he needed more? More thrusting, more stretching, more fullness.

"Shh. There is nothing to gain from impatience," the beta said. He sounded out of breath. "I told you I would take care of you, didn't I? You know that I keep my promises. Be still a little longer and I will have a reward for you. You'd like a reward, wouldn't you?"

Reward. The word was slippery, its meaning elusive. A good thing, he thought. The tone of the voice said it was. Soft words, and light touches to go with them, soothing but not satisfying. He whined, wishing the beta would understand. The cock inside him was getting softer. Not filling him. Even the muscles within had given up on grasping it. He _needed_. He _hurt_.

Lightly, the thin fingers stroked his cheek. "Poor thing. You're already so far gone, aren't you? Hold still now. I have something for you."

The beta moved away, soft cock sliding out with no resistance at all, and Wolfe whimpered at the loss of warmth and touch. He didn't try to follow. Even without the order to hold still, he knew that moving made the pain worse, and the pain was already so bad. It seeped into the spaces left behind by the loss of pleasure, sending grasping tendrils into the far corners of his mind where higher thought cowered. He didn't want to think. His animal brain was hopelessly confused by the beta's sudden absence, but he resisted the siren song of understanding. He didn't want to know.

Footsteps on the stone floor. Rustling fabric. Long moments of waiting, muscles aching, so empty, feverish with heat, before the thin hands touched him again, draping something over his back.

Silk. _Silk_. So soft. So cool on his burning skin. It felt so good that he purred at it, kept purring as the hands reached beneath him to do something with the fabric beneath his breastbone. Fastening it? Tying it? The motion was repeated at the shoulders. Thinner strips of fabric there.

_Ribbons_, his brain supplied. _Those are ribbons._

"There. Omegas should wear pretty things, don't you think?" Qualls said as he finished tying the last ribbon at Wolfe's shoulder. "You like that, don't you? You're a pretty thing under all that grime and heresy." He smoothed the fabric over Wolfe's back.

It was short, this garment. Nothing like a Scholar's robe. Hardly long enough to cover his rear, the hem of it brushing his thighs. The fit of it was strange, too. Loose in the chest save for a wide ribbon that tied tight beneath his breastbone, then much too loose below there, pooling beneath him in the front. Confused, his mind clouded by pain and heat, he stared like an idiot at the trailing black ribbons until, with a swell of nausea, he understood.

It would fit him if he were pregnant.

And he would be. Gods, he would be. When he paid attention, when he set aside the screaming instinct that told him he was empty, he could tell that he was _full_, not of alpha knot, but of beta seed, sticky and oozing deeper with every passing second. Swimming with tiny sperm cells. He was far enough from sane that he thought he could feel them, a creeping tickle within.

A wail rising from his throat, he pushed up onto his hands and knees, ignoring the howling protests of his muscles. He needed to be upright, to sit, at least, if not stand. Let the foul stuff drain out of him.

Thin hands caught him by the shoulders, surprisingly strong. Or was it that he was weak? It didn't matter. He could do nothing while Qualls came around to sit on the bed with him. The hands shifted, one taking him by the scruff of the neck, the other applying pressure between his shoulder blades, and he collapsed across the torturer's lap with a defeated sob.

"There now, Scholar. There is no need to fight. I am only giving you what you need. You need to be full, don't you? I can give you that," Qualls said in the same cloyingly soft voice he used when he tended Wolfe's wounds. His hand crept down along Wolfe's spine to lift the silk that covered Wolfe's ass.

Exposed. He was exposed, and all he could do was shake with helpless sobs. No strength remained in his limbs to struggle, and more than half of him didn't want to. He was empty. He needed relief. Even his addled brain could work out how it would come.

Four fingers slid straight into him. He choked out a cry, a desperate, animal sound. The fingers spread, stretching him, sending sparks of loathsome pleasure along his nerves.

"Your body knows what it needs. Don't fight it. Take what you are given," Qualls said, and he pushed his whole hand in.

Wolfe wished he could say that he fought it, but his body drew his torturer's hand in gladly, inner muscles clamping tight around the beta's wrist as if it were an alpha's knot.

Qualls laughed, low and raspy. "Eager for this, are you? Such an obedient body you have. Shh. There is no need to cry. This feels good, doesn't it? Like an alpha, but bigger. Better."

No. It wasn't better. Not at all. He would have given anything to have Nic instead of this. The longing struck hard and fast, bringing fresh tears to his eyes and pain to his chest, even as the lower part of his body throbbed with arousal. He wanted Nic. Needed Nic. Closing his eyes, he drew on all the memories of his lover he'd clung to. An affectionate smile on a stubbly face. Eyes turned brown by dim light. Tanned skin stretched over flexed muscles. Tattoos and scars. One by one, the visions came and went. It was no use. The fantasy could not hold up against the horror of the reality he was trapped in.

Little thought at all could withstand the intensity of sensation within him. He was stretched to his limits, unbearably full, nerves so overstimulated that they registered neither pleasure nor pain, but scalding pressure like steam building up in a boiler. His entire body tensed with it, teeth clenching and hands balled into fists, lungs heaving with ragged sobs. The feeling filled him until there was nothing left but the instinctive need for release, and then, with a wonderful, terrible twist of the beta's hand, not even that. The climax came on him violently as Translation, tearing him apart and putting him back together weak and nauseous.

Wolfe lay shattered and breathless, sore and shaking, without even the strength to cough up the bile that burned the back of his throat. With a wet, popping sound, Qualls pulled his fist out past Wolfe's spasming internal muscles, leaving him gapingly empty. An uncomfortable feeling, but with the instinctive need of his heat sated, not the worst of it by far. Far worse was the sticky feeling left in the hand's wake as it trailed over his buttocks to smooth the silk of the slip back over his bare skin.

Terrible, too, was the gentle rasp of Qualls's voice. "So much better to obey, isn't it? Things could be so much better if you stopped being so stubborn. You could be cared for, dressed in pretty things, kept safe and warm and clean. The Library cares for its obedient servants, Scholar Wolfe."

He kept his eyes closed, wishing he could close out the sound of that voice and the words that might as well have been salt on his wounds. The beta's bony hand rubbed his back in mockery of comfort, and all he could do was whimper.

"Poor, exhausted omega," Qualls said, giving Wolfe's bottom a patronizing pat. "I wonder if you even have another peak in you, weak as you are. Best get some food in you, get your strength up. Come on, let's get you comfortable, and I'll get you something to eat. You'd like that, wouldn't you?"

More false kindness, and Wolfe had no power to refuse it. All too easily, Qualls got Wolfe's limp, useless body tucked into bed, lying on his stomach with the blanket pulled up to his shoulders. It might have been comfortable if not for the sticky, creeping sensation deep inside him. He bit his lip, trying to block it out, but it was no use. He could feel the sperm swarming his egg.

_Impossible_, came the last, faint whisper of his sanity.

But the delusion was stronger, so tactile and terrifying that it came as a relief when Qualls returned to him with a bowl that smelled of something so rich and savory that animal hunger washed away his thoughts.

It would have been easier if Qualls were cruel, if he'd been thrown back onto the cold stones of his cell and left in the dark instead of wrapped in warm blankets and fed by the torturer's own hand.

Kindness made the inevitable cruelty so much worse.


	10. Alexandria

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Trauma processing, a nightmare, and some comfort for Wolfe. This chapter deals with the loss of an unwanted pregnancy.

**July, 2030**

There was relief in finally miscarrying, once the painkillers took effect to blunt the cramps. The pregnancy wasn't a problem to be solved anymore, but a problem Wolfe's body had solved for him. This time, at least, it was an acceptable solution.

For some values of acceptable.

He stood in the shower, steaming water running down his back, and watched drips of blood swirl down the drain. Less of it than he'd thought there would be, but this was apparently the tail end of the whole thing. He'd lost most of it in his sleep. There hadn't been so much to loose. More uterine lining than anything else, and that likely hadn't properly developed in the first place. Qualls had sabotaged his own spawn's chances with his abuse.

There was a certain savage satisfaction in knowing that, and in seeing the end of even this tiny piece of Qualls. This was a victory, of a sort, if not one he'd won intentionally. Wolfe would take what he could get, at this point.

Drip. Drip. Crimson on sandy brown tile. Diluted quickly to pink and swept away by the torrent of clean, clear water. He wanted to think of it as cleansing, but mostly, he felt numb.

Would that the memories could be so easily washed away.

They came at moments both predictable and unexpected, at times triggered by some recognizable cause, at times catching him off guard. There was little logic to them, not even a pattern to follow. Some were like shadows at the back of his thoughts, quiet but ever present. Others came like lightning strikes, vivid flashes of image or sound or sensation, there and gone, leaving him reeling. Others still took hold of him like heavy chains and dragged him down into the murky waters of madness where he could go hours without finding his way back to the present. Most of his dreams were like that, making every return to wakefulness feel like reaching the shore half-drowned.

It was a bitter irony of his newfound freedom that he could no longer control his mind's flights of fancy. The same imagination that had allowed him to summon the comforting illusion of Nic in the cell now tormented him with images of the cell no matter how he tried to forget. Most of the time, it was safest not to think at all.

Water pounded in a scalding torrent over his shoulders, hammering out the aches that clustered there. Wet hair hung into his face, not enough of a nuisance to bother removing. His legs shook, tired but not yet ready to give out, and he leaned forward with his hands against the smooth tile of the walls for support. Hanging his head, he watched thin swirls of red flow with the currents around his feet. The water started to cool, but he couldn't bring himself to move. He wasn't ready to get out yet.

The shower was lukewarm when Nic came in to shut it off, fussing about how cold the water was and long Wolfe had been in there. Wolfe didn't think it had been so long, but then, time was no easier to hold onto than the shower's flowing water. He'd had a good sense of time once, but that was lost in a dark place where it had been meaningless.

Without protest, he let Nic guide him out of the shower and sat on Nic's lap to be wrapped in a thick, soft towel. Resting his forehead against Nic's broad shoulder, he purred as Nic rubbed his shoulders through the towel in firm, vigorous strokes. Nic's scent was stronger than it had been, fresh and woody; he must not have taken his blocking pill. No reason to bother with that now. It would be days until the bleeding fully stopped, another week or two after that before heat was even a remote possibility. Very remote given the current state of Wolfe's health, or so the Medica said. He wasn't sure he trusted that, and hoped she would clear him to start blockers when the bleeding finished. The prospect of heat unnerved him.

For now, though, there was no reason not to bask in the haze of Nic's scent as it mingled with his own. Scent and touch, two senses he'd never fully been able to replicate in fantasy, both pleasantly engaged now as Nic dried him. He couldn't even bring himself to protest beging helped into fresh clothes, though he didn't need the help anymore. He'd worked out how to dress himself so long as there were no buttons or other fasteners to be dealt with, and there was nothing of the sort on the loose-fitting High Garda leisure uniform they both favored for lazy days at home. Nic had already taken care of the drawstrings on all Wolfe's trousers, tying them tight enough to keep them from falling down but loose enough to allow the trousers to be tugged over Wolfe's protruding hip bones.

He'd seen his body in the mirror a few times since coming home. It wasn't an easy sight to see, so mostly, he avoided looking. He'd seen enough to understand why none of his clothes fit right anymore.

Even his new underwear didn't fit right. High Garda Medica issue, designed for miscarrying omegas, which was different from the kind intended for menstrual cycles, apparently. If this was meant to fit his body, he didn't want to know how bad the other kind would be. Lined with absorbent padding, it was too tight in some places, too bulky in others, and awkwardly cut. The fabric, at least, was soft. The quiet, whispering memories told him he should be grateful for that. Grateful to have anything at all. The last time he'd bled...

No. He took a deep breath of Nic's sent to drive the memory away. That was over. He was home, and Nic was helping him up. Speaking to him.

"Shall we go outside and let your hair dry in the sun?"

He nodded. Yes. Sun would chase away the shadows.

* * *

_The day passed peacefully, or what passed for peacefully anymore. In dreams, however, the cramps returned, magnifying into the full contractions of labor. He lay on his side, curled around a stomach that bulged out like a rounded mountain and a chest like foothills. The pain crested, and he howled with it, grasping helplessly at the air in front of him. He was dreaming. He knew it, but that did nothing to lessen the desperate need for relief._

_In a gentle rumble of a purr, Nic answered, "It's all right, love, I'm coming." Nic's weight settled on the bed in front of him, and a moment later, he felt a soothing bite at his neck. Nic embraced him, sheltered him, comforted him, and for a flicker of a moment, he thought this might be one of the better dreams. The soft, sad kind of dream he'd had so many nights in the prison, one that showed him visions of a peaceful life with Nic that he could never have. He could guess at its direction, all too predictable visions of fatherhood and domestic life. A life he'd never have chosen for himself, but he would wake from it wet-eyed and aching with longing all the same. Purring, he let himself fall into its story and the escape it offered from his ever-present misery._

_But a voice spoke from behind him, and even that small hope shattered. A thin shadow of a voice, strangely gentle, like soft silk over rough stone. "It won't be long now, Scholar Wolfe. You're doing so well. Go on and push now."_

_Pain exploded at those words as if a knife had been plunged into his abdomen and thrust straight through until it emerged between his legs. Push, the voice told him, but he couldn't begin to imagine how to do anything more than sob and cling to Nic._

_"Shh, my love, breathe," Nic said, loving and gentle and utterly unaware of the threat right behind them. "A deep breath now and push, just like the Medica said."_

_Medica. Gods, is that what his broken mind had turned the man to? Memories flashed, bloody needles, murky vials, the gleam of a scalpel, and pain tore through him once more. Originating deep inside him this time, as if his body was tearing itself apart from within. And with the pain came the instinct to push, an urge he could no more fight than the urge to breathe. Muscles he'd never even known he had strained, and he felt a heavy mass inside him shift._

_The mass and the pain moved downward. Breath by straining breath. Nic stroked him, purred to him, offered his arm for Wolfe to bite, oblivious to the danger. Wolfe was dying, his body being ripped apart, and Nic thought it only labor pains. His murderer stood within reach, and Nic didn't know. There was no way to tell him. All Wolfe could do was scream. Frantic, panicked, gasping screams that did nothing to slow the shredding pain._

_It emerged in a burst of agony and blood that gushed like water from between Wolfe's legs, a mass so large it couldn't possibly have fit where it came from. But, of course, it hadn't fit. It had torn its way free and left him sobbing and helpless, too weak to move as the life poured from his body._

_"Ah, here it is. Look. Strong and healthy." Warm words, but the voice that spoke them was like ice, as were the hands that reached between Wolfe's legs to lift the squirming mass and bring it up to thrust into his arms._

_Weak and shaking, he took it. He didn't have the strength to fight. Nic held it with him, still purring, nuzzling Wolfe's face. Not yet looking down at the thing in their arms. Not yet seeing._

_In shape, it was an infant, but everything about it was wrong. Its face was as gray as the blanket that swaddled it, gray as a shadow, its eyes were soulless and empty, and its teeth..._

_Its teeth, like serrated blades, dripped with blood._

_Wolfe's blood. So much of it there on the creature's teeth. So little remaining in Wolfe's own veins. Not enough to stay upright. Not enough to keep his eyes open. His strength failing, Wolfe reached for Nic, the bundled creature falling from his arms._

_The last thing he saw was the horror on Nic's face._

* * *

He woke screaming and flailing, his nose assailed by the musty smell of his own fear mingled with the fresh-cut cedar of Nic's protectiveness. His arms were pinned at his sides, and he thrashed, writhed, teeth snapping at the air.

"Christopher. Christopher, love, wake up." Gentle but insistent words in his ear. "You are safe. You are home. Wake up."

With all the strength he could wring out of his aching body, Wolfe heaved himself over, toward the voice, teeth bared, a vicious growl welling up in his throat.

In that same instant, he was free, and the cedar scent in the air softened. The smell of a submissive alpha. But that made no sense.

Confused, he opened his eyes.

Blinked in the sudden brightness. Not so bright. Not really. Only glows. But turned far brighter than his eyes had grown accustomed to over the past year.

The blur beneath him resolved itself into Nic's form, lying prone, neck bared. Without meeting Wolfe's eyes, Nic said, "I won't hurt you. I will never hurt you. You are safe."

The words took their time registering in Wolfe's shattered mind. When they did, the understanding shot through him with a jolt of pain that raced from his fingers to his spine. He'd bared his teeth at Nic. Growled at Nic. His lover. His alpha. He was home with Nic. Home, safe, free. And putting entirely too much pressure on his broken hands to hold himself over Nic. His arms gave out, and he collapsed shivering onto Nic's chest. Guilt made his blood turn to ice even as tears of relief welled up in his eyes. Unable to speak, he whimpered, as much explanation or apology as he could offer.

"Ssh. It's all right." Nic's arms wrapped around him. Lightly, gently. Carefully. "I startled you. I'm sorry. Breathe, love. You're safe with me."

Nic's scent shifted back toward protective, and to his shame, Wolfe couldn't help but nuzzle into it. His nose sought Nic's scent glands like a magnet drawn to iron, until his face was buried against Nic's neck and he was gasping in lungful after lungful of it. Cedar, fresh and green as a forest, strong and protective. Undertones of smoke, warm and soft. Wolfe knew he didn't deserve the comfort of it. Not when he'd just attacked Nic. In a logical world, Nic should have shoved him away.

Or retaliated. Put the out-of-control omega in his place. That thought, and the memories that lurked behind it, made Wolfe shake all the harder. No chance of holding back his tears now. No sense in it, either. After that display of aggression, he certainly didn't have any dignity left to lose.

_As if you had any in the first place_, whispered a voice at the back of his thoughts. _Omega slut, presenting yourself to anyone who'll fill up your hole._

He couldn't even convince himself that voice was wrong. Not with the last tendrils of his nightmare wrapped around his thoughts and strange-fitting absorbent briefs soaking up irrefutable evidence of how easily he'd given himself up. Aching in heart and body alike, he whined. The thin, helpless sound of a wounded beast.

"Oh, Chris." Nic's voice was so soft. Nic's hands, stroking Wolfe's hair and back, were so gentle.

Wolfe had heard, many times, that there was nothing like the tenderness of an alpha caring for their pregnant mate. Usually from the sorts of busybodies who couldn't imagine why he hadn't gone and birthed a whole brood already. Nic would take such good care of him, they'd all said. He could have known the truth of the matter, if only he'd found the courage to reveal his condition to Nic before it was too late. Nonsense without any basis in fact, most likely. It seemed impossible that there could be any greater tenderness than that which Nic was showing now. Caring not for his pregnant mate, but for his wounded mate. His bleeding mate.

Miscarrying the spawn of another. Cause for Nic to celebrate, if those who argued alphas were ruled by instinct were to be believed.

But there was only sorrow in Nic's voice as he murmured soothing words to Wolfe. Nothing but love and sympathy in his touch. Wolfe couldn't convince himself he deserved any of it, but he didn't have the strength to fight his own greed for his alpha. Nuzzling Nic's neck, he drank in his lover's scent and all the comfort Nic had to offer. Eventually, he found his way back to sleep.


End file.
